I Still Believe In Magic: A Brief Review Of Two New Television Personalities Compilations From Fire Records

Dan Treacy remains, like Lawrence of Felt and Denim, a living enigma. And like Lawrence, Dan Treacy has purused a very Sixties-inspired sound over the course of dozens of recordings and multiple decades. Treacy, of course, did most of his exploring via the vehicle of Television Personalities, a band with a revolving cast of supporting players, and a sustained fascination with the pop music of the psychedelic era, and the celebrities whose lives made those years so exciting and vital when compared to the more moribund modern days.

The folks at Fire Records have been doing a great job at reissuing the releases of Treacy and his crew, and they've offered up another set of superb releases now, with these two new singles compilations dropping next Friday. Some Kind of Happening: Singles 1978-1989 and Some Kind of Trip: Singles 1990-1994 collect more than 60 A- and B-sides over the course of a few discs to offer up a parallel history to that presented on the official Television Personalities albums from the same years. Listened to on their own, these compilations reveal a band making ragged, clever, and very affecting alt-pop long before anyone ever thought of the need to come up with a term like that. Prefiguring the Paisley Underground movement on these shores, and the indie clangs of bands like Pavement and Apples in Stereo later, the tunes here on these sets are ones that are as vital examples of great British songwriting as anything from Ray Davies or Syd Barrett in the earlier eras. That Dan Treacy was born too late to participate in the Swinging London revolution as it was happening is something that is to be mourned, but he certainly carried on the styles perfectly years later, even if he was sometimes underappreciated while doing it.

Some Kind of Happening: Singles 1978-1989 has a lot of rough goodness on it, which is to be expected because Dan Treacy was really operating in a vacuum in these years. Starting off in the peak post-punk years and continuing up to the first wave of Brit indie-pop after C86, this set shows Television Personalities making music that looked to the distant past for inspiration. And in those years, there were few who would have thought, as Dan Treacy did, to cover "Apples and Oranges", a classic from the Syd Barrett-era of The Pink Floyd. And while some of what's on this first set is familiar ("The Prettiest Girl in the World", "Where's Bill Grundy Now?"), there are other songs here that hint at just what made Television Personalities so unique. The bright "I Know Where Syd Barrett Lives" made Treacy's points of inspiration crystal-clear, in an era when many of his peers were reaching for new keyboards, while "Smashing Time" is even better, with Dan referencing a classic film from those Swinging London-years and offering up the sort of tune that sounded utterly unlike nearly anything being made then. There's a lot of lo-fi charm here on Some Kind of Happening: Singles 1978-1989, with a bunch of the more familiar Television Personalities singles here. Still, stuff like "I Still Believe in Magic", an odd bedsit ramble, and the fuzzy "Salvador Dali's Garden Party" are the kind of compositions that really make this such a winning compilation, flashes of future Britpop stuff blueprinted here.

Some Kind of Trip: Singles 1990-1994 sees Television Personalities enter an era where, thanks to Creation Records, lots of bands were starting to at least mine a similar vein of British indie-pop, if not draw from the same set of influences that Dan Treacy was drawing from. And while some of what's here on this second set of singles is fairly well-known stuff for fans of this group ("Strangely Beautiful", "She's Never Read My Poems", and "My Imaginary Friend"), there's loads more that goes off in other directions. "You, Me and Lou Reed" sounds about what you'd expect it would sound like, while "Goodnight Mr. Spaceman" reveals that Dan Treacy was, at least for a spell, entirely capable of making Nuggets-inspired rock that should have been much more popular in the era. Still, Treacy's stuff was popular, at least with those who were signed to Creation Records back then. The remix of "Goodnight Mr. Spaceman" and the lengthy "If I Was Your Girlfriend" prove that Treacy was best when he stuck to the formula he'd worked out while cribbing from the Swinging London bands, 'cause these diversions are only really necessary for hardcore devotees of TVP. And, thankfully, Some Kind of Trip: Singles 1990-1994 is so full of music that there remains lots that's valuable here, even amid a few of Treacy's rare misfires from the years covered by this second singles compilation.

Some Kind of Happening: Singles 1978-1989 and Some Kind of Trip: Singles 1990-1994 in some ways prove how Dan Treacy was adept at adapting to the changing realities of the British indie-scene, his talents evolving as a writer and performer as tastes changed around him and listeners grew more receptive to the kind of pop he was pursuing. And while some studio albums from Television Personalities are certainly stronger and more consistent releases, at least these two singles compilations, as massive as they are, provide a picture of the breadth of Treacy's talents. Very handsomely housed in two book-style cases, Some Kind of Happening: Singles 1978-1989 and Some Kind of Trip: Singles 1990-1994 are necessary additions to an already-impressive program of Television Personalities reissues from the fine folks at Fire Records.

Some Kind of Happening: Singles 1978-1989 and Some Kind of Trip: Singles 1990-1994 are both out on Friday via Fire Records.

[Photos: Fire Records]