Many thanks to Ian White of The Wendys for this great Factory artefact which he originally circulated via Facebook. Ian explains: "We had just delivered the master tapes of our album Gobbledygook to Factory. Tony Wilson sent us this lovely and inspiring letter. It was fantastic to know Tony and Factory had faith in us."

Transcript

"F.G. album, as in 'fucking great'. It's a pleasure to know you were right in signing an act. It's a pleasure to contemplate the exciting years ahead with a fine group. But most of all it's a pleasure to listen to such fabulous bloody songs. Thanks for an ace Xmas present, boys.

Yours

Anthony H. Wilson"

--

It's Fac artefact double whammy because the letterhead used is a perfect example of Fac 311 stationery.

See also: Factory Records stationery

Labels: The_Wendys, Tony_Wilson

A quick update on the Shiiine On Weekender which takes place at the Butlin's Minehead Arena from 10-13 November. As previously announced, there are plenty of ex-FAC bands involved including co-headliners Happy Mondays plus Peter Hook & The Light, A Certain Ratio, Space Monkeys, The Wendys, Sons of the Descent (featuring Ian White of The Wendys) and Time For Action (featuring Dermo ex-Northside who also has a DJ slot) and DJ Bobby Langley.

Plus there's a screening / Q&A of the Do You Own The Dancefloor? documentary film.

Tickets are available now via www.shiiineonweekender.com and there's currently a discount promo code offer.

Labels: A_Certain_Ratio, Bobby_Langley, gigs, Peter_Hook, Sons_of_the_Descent, Space_Monkeys, The_Light, The_Wendys, Time_for_Action

The Wendys make another highly welcome live return September with Sons of the Descent (Ian White out of The Wendys' other band) in support on Saturday 30 September at Audio in Glasgow.

Please note: Time for Action are no longer playing at this gig but the flyers don't seem to have been updated.

Tickets priced 12.00 GBP are available from macevents.bigcartel.com until the end of May.

--

The Wendys
with Sons of the Descent
Saturday 30 September
Audio
Midland St
Glasgow

www.tickets-scotland.com.

Labels: gigs, Sons_of_the_Descent, The_Wendys

The Wendys are late additions to an excellent bill on Saturday 17 June at Audio in Glasgow alongside The Orchids and headliners The Railway Children who continue their reunion gigs which started last year.

Tickets priced 15.00 in advance are available now via Tickets Scotland

--

The Railway Children
The Orchids
The Wendys [via archive live video stream]

Audio
14 Midland St
Glasgow G1 4PP

Facebook event
Official site

The Wendys 7.45pm - 8.10pm
The Orchids 8.25pm - 9.10pm
The Railway Children 9.30pm - end

Labels: gigs, The_Railway_Children, The_Wendys

As well as joining the reconvened original line-up of The Wendys for dates later in the year, Ian White has got together with Hugh Duggie (Lowlife) to form the "pop-tinged noir" duo Sons of the Descent. The singles Look at the Sky / Flighty and Situation in Your Head have been followed by the excellent album Lazy Glamour with everything being released via their own Brawsome Productions.

Situation in Your Head also has a rather excellent video which makes highly innovative use of smartphones.



Lazy Glamour is available now via iTunes and Bandcamp

Keep up to date with the latest via Facebook, Twitter and Soundcloud.

Labels: Sons_of_the_Descent, The_Wendys

[updated 5 June]

The Railway Children continue their reunion gigs that have seen them play New York City, Manchester, Wigan, Minehead (Shiiine On) and London over the last year.

This time they're heading north of the border to play Audio in Glasgow on 17 June with support from The Wendys and The Orchids.

Tickets priced 15.00 in advance are available now via Tickets Scotland

--

The Railway Children
The Orchids
The Wendys

Audio
14 Midland St
Glasgow G1 4PP

Facebook event
Official site

Labels: gigs, The_Railway_Children, The_Wendys

This year's Shiiine On Weekender at the Butlin's Minehead Arena from 10-13 November is shaping up to be a quite a bit of a FAC fest what with Happy Mondays being one of the three headliners and Peter Hook & The Light, A Certain Ratio, Space Monkeys, The Wendys and Time For Action. Plus there's a screening / Q&A of the Do You Own The Dancefloor? documentary film.

Tickets priced from 219 GBP (earlybird) are available now via www.shiiineonweekender.com.

Labels: A_Certain_Ratio, gigs, Happy_Mondays, Peter_Hook, Space_Monkeys, The_Light, The_Wendys, Time_for_Action

The Wendys make a highly welcome return in late September with rapidly rising stars Time for Action (featuring Dermo out of Northside) in support on Saturday 30 September at Audio in Glasgow.

Earlybird tickets priced 10.00 GBP are available from macevents.bigcartel.com until the end of May.

--

The Wendys
with Time for Action
Saturday 30 September
Audio
Midland St
Glasgow

www.tickets-scotland.com.

Labels: The_Wendys, Time_for_Action

We continue our guide to Factory Records promotional videos with Mark from the Record Peddler.

This time we look at Fac numbers between 250 and 300.

Fac 255: Cath Carroll – Beast on the Streets

This tape comes in a blue plastic box with a Factory TM black and white insert cover Detailing Artist, Title, Planned release date 17th September 1990 and Fac 255. The tape has Signal Vision typed labels. The full video, lasting approximately 7 minutes, fades in before the soundtrack begins and shows Cath wandering around the streets of New York after dark, interspersed with footage of a religious nature. The footage is a mixture of both colour and black and white.

Fac 257: Electronic – Getting Away With It

This tape comes in a blue plastic box. Both the front of the box and tape have Signal Vision typed labels. The full length video of the band in a studio is in full colour and lasts 4mins 24secs and fades to black.

Fact 262: Happy Mondays 'Madchester' compilation video

This promotional copy of the video comes in a blue plastic box with Signal Vision typed labels on the front of the box and tape. Although eventually released as a Factory/Virgin issue, these labels state Factory Only. This is the full video, with the credits at the end, lasting approximately, 49mins 40 secs.

Fac 263: New Order – Round & Round

This tape comes in a blue plastic box. The tape itself has a Signal Vision typed label on the front. The full video starts with a title screen 'New Order, Round and Round, Factory Records, Paula Grief Inc, 3:59, UK Edit'.

The full video follows. A selection of female models interspersed with sporadic objects and images.

This fades out to black at the end of the track and the legend 'C1989 Factory Communications Ltd; appears and fades to black. The full; video lasts approximately 4mins 15 secs.

Fac 267: Revenge – Pineapple Face (MTV Version)

This tape comes in a blue plastic box with a cover featuring a cut-down 12" sleeve. The tape has a Signal Vision typed title sticker on the front of the box and also on the tape. The video begins from black to a slide with the legend 'Revenge, "Pineapple Face", 4:11, NTSC Stereo, 4/24/90, 525 Post over a still of Peter Hook taken from the video. A second slide appears of similar design with the legend 'produced and directed by Suze Randall, Creative Director Peter Saville, director of photography and Editor Aaron Landy.

The full length video follows and fades to black before the legend 'C1990 Capitol Records. Inc.' appears across the bottom of the screen and fades to black. The full video lasts 4mins 30secs including titles.

Fac 267: Revenge – Pineapple Face (Club Version)

This tape comes in a blue plastic box with a cover featuring a cut-down 12" sleeve. The tape has a Signal Vision typed title sticker on the front of the box. The video begins from black to a slide with the legend 'Revenge, "Pineapple Face", Club Mix, 6:45, NTSC Stereo, 4/24/90, 525 Post over a still of Peter Hook taken from the video. A second slide appears of similar design with the legend 'produced and directed by Suze Randall, Creative Director Peter Saville, director of photography and Editor Aaron Landy.

Apart from the obvious difference in running time, this is a much more explicit video lasting 7mins 14 seconds including the titles.

Fac 271: New Order – The Advertising Technique (Mix One, Two, Three)

This tape comes in a black plastic box with a label insert from Vector Television. There is a hand-written label adhered to the tape itself which also has the Vector Television logo. The tape contains three different promotional videos for the New Order 'Technique' album. The first mix starts from a countdown clock with the legend 'Factory Records, New Order, Advertising Technique Mix One, 30 second, Date 10/03/89, Prod No: MC/8598, Vector Television 0161-442-7887, CAR 061 443 1360.' The second advertisement has the same countdown clock and details apart from the legend 'Mix Two'. The third advertisement, likewise apart from 'Mix 3'. The footage of the same models used in the 'Round and Round' video is the subject matter, but different questions have been asked of the models and they actually speak as opposed to being silent in the music video.

Also, the legend 'New Order, Technique' appears the end of each advert. Mix One is towards the top of the screen, Mix Two is in the middle and Mix Three is at the bottom of the screen. This tape has been in my possession since 1989 and I have never seen another copy available for sale.

Fac 272: Happy Mondays – Step On

This tape comes in a blue plastic box with a typed title on the front of the box and also on the front of the tape. The track starts from a black screen and the full video fades to black at the end and the legend 'C1990 Factory Communications' appears at the bottom of the screen and fades to a black screen. The full video lasts approximately 5mins in total.

Fac 273: New Order – Run 2

This tape comes in a blue plastic box with a Signal Vision typed label on both the front of the box and the front of the tape. The full video has a strange storyline interspersed with footage of the band on stage and some photographic stills. The full video lasts 3mins 35secs. This is a very limited promo as was the single itself.

Fac 279: Revenge – Slave

This tape comes in a blue plastic box with a Factory TM black and white promotional cover which has Artist: Revenge, Title: Slave, Planned Release: 17th September 1990, Fac No: Fac 279partly printed and partly handwritten A Signal Vision Typed label is on the tape.

The full video starts from a black screen and features a montage of scenes of a female being stripped and tied to a chair in a warehouse setting, footage of the band members in the backstreets of Manchester and in Fac 251 Dry Bar. There is a business man in a taxi, the band members in what look like gas masks and with guns in a basement to the end, the female is released and is seen dancing!

The soundtrack ends and the video carries on with flashed images before ending with a black screen. The full video lasts approximately 5mins 55secs.

Fac 287: Electronic – Get The Message

This tape comes in a black plastic box with no labelling. The tape has a Signal Vision typed label. The full video fades in at the start from a black screen. Footage of the band members wandering around a foreign town and desert. Other assorted images and Bernard lip-synching to the track, in full colour and with aerial views of lakes and mountains are the highlights.

At the end, the picture fades to black and the legend 'C1991 Factory Communications Ltd' appears at the bottom of the screen before fading to black. The full video lasts approximately 4minutes.

Fac 293: New Order – World in Motion

This tape comes in a blue plastic box with no labelling. The tape has a Signal Vision typed label.

The full video starts from a black screen and features the classic video of the band, Keith Allen and various members of the England squad singing along interspersed with footage of England in matches.

The video fades to a black screen at the end and the legend 'C Factory/MCA Records 1990' appears at the bottom of the screen. The full video lasts 4mins 13secs

Fac 297: The Wendys – Pulling My Fingers Off

This tape comes in a blue plastic box with a Factory TM black and white promotional cover which has Artist: The Wendys, Title: pulling my fingers off, Planned Release: 22nd April 1991, Fac No: Fac 297 partly printed and partly handwritten. A Signal Vision Typed label is on the tape.

The full video starts from a black screen and features a montage of scenes of the band lip synching to the soundtrack. These are live and studio shots and are interspersed with the band in a city setting. Some obscure, random views are thrown in for good measure. A mixture of colour and black and white are used.

The full video lasts 4mins 4secs and fades to a black screen at the end. There are colour bars sometime after the footage ends.

Labels: Cath_Carroll, Electronic, Happy_Mondays, New_Order, Revenge, The_Wendys, video

The Wendys will be live at the Berkeley Suite in Glasgow on 4 February 2012. This will be the first full-set gig by the original line-up in over 14 years.

More info on the Wendys' new official Twitter.

Labels: events, gigs, The_Wendys

If you're an avid or casual follower of the Cerysmatic Factory Message Board, the discovery of a cache of original Factory Records master tapes by artists such as The Wendys, Northside, Section 25, X-O-Dus and Cath Carroll by Oli Wilson whilst clearing his dad's Loft won't have escaped your attention.

A number of the artists in question (the full list also includes Hopper, Fadela, The Railway Children and Thick Pigeon) have already posted on the thread or been in contact with Cerysmatic and/or Oli regarding the find.

In his message, Oli describes what's happened "When clearing my dads loft out I found lots of original master tapes from Factory Records releases over the years. I intend to return these to their rightful owners (the artist) or preferably I would like to put them into an archive in Manchester (whether this is Museum of Science and Industry or somewhere else I dont know yet)."

"I would rather store them as so far they have been kept in great condition by my old man and it would be great to keep them that way... have a feeling that if they aren't kept like that they would just gather dust and rot away in a studio!!!"

That the tapes have been lovingly looked after for all these years is not a surprise given their custodian. Of course, under Factory's infamous "no contract" policy, all the artists owned their own music and Factory "owned nothing".

It would be difficult to begrudge the reunion of the tapes with their rightful owners (particularly if rare and unreleased, or even un-re-released) material exists. However, the donation of such historically significant material to an institution such as MoSI has a nice ring to it. Perhaps there is scope for both to happen.

Now... where's Fadela!?

Labels: Factory_Records, Factory_Too, Fadela, labels, Northside, Oliver_Wilson, Section_25, The_Railway_Children, The_Wendys, Thick_Pigeon, X-O-Dus

Ian White out of The Wendys touches in with Cerysmatic for a bit of news: "We have just recorded a cover of a song by The Prids. It's for a benefit album for the band who were in an accident on tour recently. We have been in contact with them for some time and just thought it would be a good excuse to force ourselves out of inactivity. On the bright side it looks like we can work while geographically separated."

Thanks to Ian and best wishes to The Prids for a speedy recovery.

Spookily, following this news Cerysmatic unearthed this story about the Space Monkeys being involved in a similar accident about 10 years ago:

"Space Monkeys miraculously escaped with minor injuries after being in a horrific accident in which their van overturned and skidded along the motorway for over a quarter of a mile. The Manchester-based band were on their way back home after appearing at the Dour Festival in Belgium when a tyre blew out, and - in the words of bassist Dominic Morrison - 'the bus tipped over, the window smashed and I was dragged along the road. Sparks were flying through the bus and we seemed to slide along forever'.

"Morrison, guitarist Neil Walsh and sound engineer Trevor Brown were all taken to hospital and treated for cuts, bruises and shock, but all have now been discharged."

- From Melody Maker, 25 July 1998

Labels: Space_Monkeys, The_Wendys

Not that this is becoming a sports blog or anything but Cerysmatic was intrigued to hear Blue Monday playing on the PA yesterday when Andy Murray beat Fabrice Santoro in the 3rd round of the Paris Masters.

What will it be if he beats Gasquet in today's Quarter-Final!? Something by The Wendys perhaps...

Labels: The_Wendys

The Wendys' post-Factory album 'Sixfoot Wingspan' is available to buy on CD at www.starshaped.co.uk for 9.00 GBP including worldwide postage and packing.

Labels: The_Wendys

The Wendys have put four tracks from their second album Sixfoot Wingspan on MySpace. The tracks are 'Welcome', 'In A Long Time', 'One Oar Short' and 'It's The Job That Turns Me On'. More stuff is promised soon.

Don't forget to check out Art Plastic, the new band featuring Ian White and Jonathan Renton from The Wendys, also on MySpace.

Labels: The_Wendys

Art Plastic is ex-FACers Ian and Jonathan who were in The Wendys. They have a new MySpace site where you can listen to new recordings made in Ian's house.

Labels: The_Wendys

The 'New Factory', the Fac 251 headquarters building that Factory commissioned at One Charles Street in Manchester was quite an architectural landmark. Ben Kelly (also the designer of Fac 51 The Hacienda and Fac 201 Dry) and "co-designer" Elena Massucco brought on the style. In this excerpt from a City Life magazine article on the building (and also the Siemens building in West Didsbury), Elena Massucco explains some of the philosophy behind its design, in particular "the slot" (the front door, the exterior of which can be glimpsed in this photo of The Wendys): "there was originally a door there, and we just wanted to make an impressive gesture at the crossroads, bringing the building out into the outside world: it would tie it up for us." The slot allows you, on entering the building, to see up to the first and second floors, and vice versa. "It was important for the first floor (the office level) to have a feeling of people going in and out - they don't have to be cut off".

Labels: Ben_Kelly, FAC201_Dry, FAC251_The_Factory, FAC51_The_Hacienda, The_Wendys

Guest DJs at the Beautiful 2000 night at Fac 51 The Hacienda in the early 90s included people like John McCready, Manchester's favourite quizmaster (shurely shome mishtake, Ed.) Elliott Eastwick and Matt 'n' Pat from Central Station Design.

Matt recalls how they got the gig: "SO yeah this was a night me and our Pat were asked to do by Paul Cons AFTER he had heard about a night me and Pat played records at Polar's Bar (Swan Street, near the old Record Peddler, now Bar Fringe) in Ancoats, run by one of our mates: Lee Pickering (no relation to Mike). On the night we played everything from X-Ray Spex, The Ramones and Sex Pistols to George Formby, plus "Saturday afternoon who do we watch? .... IT'S U-NITED", an old Man Utd football team song from the 70s plus some old 78s records like Tommy Steele's Singing the Blues, and Winifred Atwell's 'Piano Boogie'. It was a packed night!"

Check out the new David Knopov pages in the Designers section. David did the graphic identity for Beautiful 2000 (although on a week-by-week basis Rebecca Goodwin and Murray Healy handled duties) and also designed covers for The Wendys.

Labels: Central_Station_Design, FAC51_The_Hacienda, The_Wendys

This is the title of a forthcoming live album by Revenge to be released on LTM in February 2005. It features the whole of their 1991 performance at Cities In The Park in Manchester's Heaton Park, an event which also featured Electronic (with guests Pet Shop Boys), Happy Mondays (finishing the Pills 'n' Thrills tour), The Durutti Column, The Wendys, The Adventure Babies, Cath Carroll and by-then-non-Factory acts A Certain Ratio and The Railway Children. The remainder of the 14-track CD is from a show in Kawasaki, Japan, several months later.

Artist: Revenge
Title: No Pain, No Gain (Live 1991)
Label: LTM
Format: 1CD (14 tracks)
Catalogue number: LTMCD 2413
Release date: 7 February 2005

LTM also has the following new CD titles in stock (as usual, you can order any of them direct from LTM ahead of the store release dates):

Paul Haig LTMCD 2408 Rhythm of Life / New York Remix
Severed Heads LTMCD 2404 Rotund for Success
The Room LTMCD 2416 In Evil Hour/Clear

Also in the works at LTM are two new dvd releases. The Wake (Live at the Hacienda and Section 25 (A SXVV DVD) are slated for release early next year. More details soon.

Thanks to James at LTM.

Labels: A_Certain_Ratio, Adventure_Babies, FAC51_The_Hacienda, Happy_Mondays, New_Order, Pet_Shop_Boys, Revenge, The_Durutti_Column, The_Railway_Children, The_Wendys

There is a long and fine history of Factory allocating the same catalogue number to different projects, intentionally or otherwise. Unrealised concepts abound in the Factory canon and sometimes the unused number was freed up for use on something else. Sometimes though a simple cock-up occurred and Factory forgot a number had already been used.

Fact 95 - The first instance of number duplication occurred when the Royal Family and The Poor's album 'The Project - Phase 1 (The Temple of the 13th Tribe' was given the number originally reserved for a 12” single by (Haçienda DJ) Greg Wilson. The single never appeared so the number was recycled.

Fac 137 - Fact 137 was the Shorts compilation video but was also allocated to the 12" single 'Genius' by Quando Quango.

Fact 150 - A strange one here because whilst Fact 150 was the New Order album 'Brotherhood', Fac 150 was assigned to the Japanese version of the PFD video (which has the regular Factory catalogue number Fac 177).

Facd 207 - Rob Gray's Little Big Band mini lp was assigned the number Facd 207 but 207 was at one time going to be his 'Digital Buskingomo' video. Sadly the video never materialised.

Fact 210 - By the time Fact 210 'England Made Me' by Cath Carroll was released, Cath's band Miaow were a distant memory but originally this number was reserved for their unreleased album 'Priceless Innuendos'.

Fac 211 - The excellent Joy Division documentary aired on Channel 4's Wired programme (of which officially packaged and numbered tapes exist) about Joy Division (and specifically the release of Fac 213 Atmosphere and Fact 250 Substance had this number but it was also attached to the 'Book of Ideas' concept detailed in the Fact 400 Palatine booklet.

Fac 221 - Tony Wilson's trip to Hollywood to raise interest in and money for the Mad Fuckers film (Fac 181) resulted in the allocation of the 221 number and badges bearing it but in a classic piece of number duplication it reappeared as the number for the 8vo Factory Contract. These contract binders date from mid-1990 starting with Cath Carroll (who allegedly signed an 8-LP deal). Two 12" x 12" clear perspex plates with screenprinted signal green, silver and signal orange design, hold with 4 metal bolts. The bolts are positioned so as to hold A4 sheets in place and to allow the number of pages to vary from contract to contract.

Fac 289 - Factory produced special notepaper to promote the release of Fact 275 'Technique' by New Order. It was given the number 289 because the campaign was launched in February 1989. Later on, Factory forgot about this and reallocated the number to The Wendys' single 'The Sun's Going To Shine For Me Soon'.

Fac 301 - This was a Factory conference held at Mottram Hall, Cheshire, 5 July 1990 for which special white notepads, flyers and white serviettes / napkins were made. The number was also allocated to a book to be written by Tim Chambers (who worked for Ikon) about the first 50 numbers in the Factory catalogue.

Fac 451 - Jane Stanton's loving documentary about Fac 51 The Haçienda which aired on Granada Television entitled 'Love Will Tear Us Apart' was given this number (currently the second highest number issued) was the same as the number given to the 'rebuilding' of the Haçienda for the movie 24 Hour Party People, itself the recipient of Fac 401.

Many thanks to OMNY.

Labels: 8vo, Joy_Division, Little_Big_Band, Miaow, New_Order, Quando_Quango, The_Royal_Family_And_The_Poor, The_Wendys, Tony_Wilson

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