Happy holidays! My apologies for the lack of news lately but my life tends to be ruled by the comings and goings
of the US Congress and they decided to make everyone’s life miserable by staying in town this year until last Friday instead of
leaving in early October as scheduled. Since the last update, the “Bug” 7″ from Harper Lee, “Drug Autumn” EP by the
Windmills, “Raincoat” EP by Melodie Group and “A Christmas Wish” 7″ from Lovejoy were all released to
general fanfare and celebration. They’re now available through all the usual agents, and the details can be found on the updated
catalogue page.
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Lovejoy 
and the Windmills celebrated their new releases by playing
sets during the Matinée Pop Spectacular on November 26 in London. Lovejoy warmed up the crowd on Sunday afternoon
at the Chapel, playing along with My Hairdresser for President and the lovely Pines. Despite some hangovers from the revelry of
Pam’s pie party the prior night, the afternoon was a smash as Dick and Keith played a brilliant acoustic set featuring “Getting Away
With It All” and “I Dream of Angels” from the two 45s along with “Fantasy Island” from the album and two Biff Bang Pow! covers.
I’ll post some photos from the event shortly.
At the conclusion of the afternoon show, everyone traveled a few blocks away to the Betsey Trotwood for the evening program
featuring 
Slipslide, the Windmills and Sportique. The show began
with the debut performance by Slipslide, a London three-piece featuring ex-Love Parade/Pure/Eva Luna frontman
Graeme Elston on vocals and guitar. The band previewed several songs from its forthcoming Matinée single “Four Day Weekend”
and played a few new ones that hold great promise as well. As someone who never had the pleasure of seeing any of Graeme’s
previous bands live, I was thrilled when Slipslide played a version of Eva Luna’s outstanding track “Eden” from their final single.
All around a great set and a really exciting start to the band’s live presence. The debut single is now set for a February release,
and we’re already talking about the follow-up which I’m hoping will feature a brilliant new song called “The Right Time” complete
with funky bass line and shaky egg parts.
Next up were the Windmills playing their second show at the Betsey Trotwood this year and a brilliant one at that! The band
has worked to perfect their 
live set, playing favorites like “Three
Sixty Degrees” and “GoodNewsBadNews” from the debut album along with the superb “Everything Is New Each Day,” the lead track
from their recent “Drug Autumn” single. They also previewed three new songs, “When It Was Winter,” “She’s So Hard,” and
“Pounds Shillings and Pence,” two of which are scheduled for release on a new Matinée single early next year. These are truly
exciting times for my friends from Southend, as they also are working on new songs for the follow-up album to “Edge of August.”
This gig marked the last one with Pete Spicer on drums, as a new chap called Rob Clarke will be providing the rhythm track for
future gigs and the band’s next recording session, scheduled for March of next year. Best of luck to Pete and a hearty hello to Rob!
As headliners of the Matinée Pop Spectacular, 
Sportique delivered a perfect set that demonstrated just how much they were in practice for their first ever US mini-tour.
It was a decidedly punk set including live favorites “The Kids Are Solid Gold” and “The Dying Fly” along with “p58” and “Anatomy
of a Fool.” They also played both tracks from last year’s “Love & Remains” 7″ and the a-side of their most recent “Don’t Believe A
Word I Say” 7″ which has become a John Peel favorite of late. In addition to numerous plays over the past two months, Sir Peel
listed it among his “Top Three Most Important Tracks of the Week” on December 8th. Stay tuned for Peel’s Festive 50 to see if it
made the cut among his year-end list.
Speaking of Sportique, they visited my country for a change for their premiere set of US dates the first week of December. While
not usually the week one chooses to holiday along the Northeast corridor, playing six shows in five days kept them busy and warm.
They started in New Haven, CT on December 6th, playing with the Butterflies of Love, Comet Gain and My Hairdresser for
President at a place called Rudy’s. I wasn’t at the show but I heard good reports all around, especially about the breakfast they
enjoyed the next morning before heading back to New York City for a show at NYU on the 7th. No worries about the cold that night,
as it was probably close to 100 degrees in the Thompson Center for Sportique’s second show, alongside the Aislers Set, Comet Gain,
Girlfrendo and Toulouse. Good fun all around.
Friday we drove south to Washington, DC for a bit of something different… playing live at Signal 66 Art Gallery with local lads the
Saturday People (click the flyer to see it in full view). This was the highlight of the tour for me…a chance to show them my
hometown and a fantastic show involving visual projection of pop artists, album artwork, live footage and other imagery during the
set, which made the experience interesting for everyone. We awoke to brilliant sunshine on Saturday, which involved a record
shop instore performance at Now! Music and Fashion in Arlington, VA before heading up the road to Swarthmore College outside
Philadelphia for a great show with the Aislers Set, Comet Gain, Girlfrendo, and Aden. Despite staying up until 5am, we got up early
enough to take in a typical American diner breakfast before they had to hit the road for their final gig, another New York City
show Sunday night at the Knitting Factory with the Aislers Set, Comet Gain, Girlfrendo, Toulouse and Steward.
It seemed like quite a whirlwind at the time and seems so now as I write all this down in retrospect. I’ll be scanning photos from the
trip to add to this page so if you missed the shows you can pretend you were there. Despite the danger of missing someone really
important, I must give a shout out to (in alphabetical order) Amy, Andy, Archie, Ben, Bethany, Dan, Eric, Greg, Keith, Kevin, Linda,
Mary, Nadine, Pat, Sean, Scott, Terry, Tim, Will, and Yoshi, as well as all the bands who made the tour possible. Hopefully they’ll be
back soon for more dates including some along the west coast.
One final thing…Greg, Mark, Rob and Amelia signed five copies of the recent single “Don’t Believe A Word I Say” and I shall be
giving them to five people chosen at random from among those of you who answer the following question: What is the best song
ever released on Matinée? Send your responses to matineepop@hotmail.com by
January 15 for consideration. I have orange and blue Sportique badges left from the shows too so if you want one of those let me
know.
Okay…this is getting rather long, but I must add that all other forthcoming
releases are on hold until January since distributors and shops tend to spend all their time in December focusing on releases by
people like the Beatles instead. Once we start up the winter releases though, there’s no end in sight as 2001 looks like a sure bet to
be Matinée’s best year yet. The first release should come from Airport Girl in the form of their debut album “Honey, I’m An
Artist.” I know this for certain because there are 1000 copies already sitting in my basement. As I reported last time, this is a
co-release with the excellent Fortuna Pop! label from England and will be available on CD and fat Czech vinyl in the New Year. I
said all sorts of nice things about them last time around, so check the link to October news at the bottom of the page if you missed
that.
The debut album from Brighton’s Harper Lee is also on
schedule for a January release. It’s called “Go Back To Bed” and features ten soon-to-be-classic tracks of melancholy pop including
the brilliant a-side from their recent 45 “Bug”…another release enjoying a bit of attention by John Peel. The band has promised a
live performance sometime next year, and I have threatened to publish their personal email addresses if they back out again, so put
that on your agenda for next year and I’ll get details out well in advance. I said other nice things about them in the last update so
check that again if you have no idea what I’m talking about.
Although a bit delayed, the debut single from Australia’s Simpático, featuring Jason Sweeney of Sweet William, will finally
see the light of day in late January. The CDEP is called the “Postal Museum” EP and combines strummed guitars and earnest vocals
with electronic rhythms and keyboards. Early comparisons have been made to Brian, Pale Saints, Trembling Blue Stars, and Magnetic
Fields so if any of that is true it’s likely to make quite a splash. Jason is enjoying the summer in Melbourne as the rest of us shiver
through the holidays. Perhaps I should plan a trip to visit him in the New Year?
The debut Ego album “La Main Devant La Bouche” could be ready
any day…I just don’t know at this point as it’s out of my hands at a French pressing plant…or perhaps on the Concorde to me now?
Our French friends are surely enjoying lots of revelry at this time of year but they should be ready to take over the world before you
start shopping for your valentine. More news next time I hope. I already mentioned the debut single from Slipslide called
“Four Day Weekend.” If everything goes as planned you’ll have that in your hands sometime in February. The Siddeleys
compilation “Slum Clearance” will be ready quite soon, as we finalized the artwork when I was in London three weeks ago and it
looks superb! The album features sixteen songs pulled from previous releases on Sombrero and Medium Cool plus numerous
unreleased songs taken from two BBC sessions of the same era. It really should prove worth the wait. Staying with the Sha La La
graduating class, good news about the Remember Fun “Train Journeys” single too, as the DAT for the third song finally
showed up after seemingly getting lost somewhere between Scotland and here. And the DAT contained eight other songs too so
there may be something more along the lines of a full length to follow the single…check here first for the details!
After that, we’re working on a new single from Lovejoy, a definitive Razorcuts compilation showcasing arguably the finest
pop band from the 1980’s, a new Windmills single, the second full length from Sportique, some new wax from
Melodie Group, the debut single from a band called the Snowdrops featuring a few people you’ve all come to know and
love, the return of the Siddeleys’ Johnny Johnson in collaboration with another famous popstar, and much more.
Possibly of interest to those of you who still read things on paper is the latest issue of Aquamarine fanzine (Issue 19), which
contains a really nice article about Matinée…”a label with a good ear for the best kind of indiepop.” I always thought my ears were
quite nice so thanks to Kim who writes the fanzine and also releases the superb collection of Bliss tapes. Her fanzines are well done
with intelligent writing and a good selection of reviews (50p from Kim, 68 Barlich Way, Lodge Park, Redditch, Worcs, B98 7JP,
England or blissaq@btinternet.com).
I’ll be doing this full time after January 5th so updates should become a bit more regular. The website should change considerably
next time around, too, with the addition of soundfiles, band pages, a direct ordering page, and a revamped catalogue page. Best
regards for a happy holiday season, and thanks very much for your patronage in 2000. Cheers, Jimmy