The Boo Radleys - Kingsize poll

Boo Radleys - Giant Steps Poll
Throw out your arms for a new sound: The Boo Radleys - C'Mon Kids poll

This album means a lot to me and I might have a few words regarding that.

As you can see my username came from this album but most know that already.

What a one-two punch to start an album. "Blue Room in Archway" has the quiet-loud thing going with touching lyrics. So much passion behind that anger. "The Old Newsstand at Hamilton Square" is on par with "From the Bench at Belvidere" as those sad songs... The smoky haze in Sice's voice, and then we get our a great riff from Martin Carr and remembering these lyrics are also his. Beautiful really.

I still can't understand how Martin Carr does not like this album, blows my mind really.

"Free Huey" still sucks on this album, I just skip it and pretend it doesn't exist. I actually don't hate the song but like "Beach House" from The Loneliest Time, you just want it to go away.

I still love this album and still feel some sadness that it was such a commercial disaster and it caused them to split. Free Huey is such a misguided song and awful single choice.

I was just listening to it the other week and it has to be Eurostar. The title track, Comb Your Hair and Old Newsstand At Hamilton Square are my other favourites.

I didn't know Martin Carr dislikes it. What has he said about it?

I associate this album with that era just before Napster when you could trade CDR's with strangers on the internet (you'd post a list of your CD collection, find a match, then each of you would burn 8 to 10 albums onto a CDR and mail them to each other). Kingsize was possibly my favorite discovery from this process.

Living in the US, I had lost touch with the band after Giant Steps (by 1998, i'm not sure they had any profile here), so this album was a really pleasant surprise.

I'll need to relisten to give this a proper assessment, but at first glance it's between "Heaven's at the Bottom of This Glass", "Blue Room in Archway", and "High as Monkeys".

Huh, i just now learned that they had an album before they were on Creation.
And they released an album in 2023?!

2023's album Eight is not good at all. 2022's album Keep on with Falling is okay in an Adult Contemporary type of way, I actually liked three songs on there but no Martin Carr so all of the guitar is stripped out and not his lyrics too.

Ichabod and I is a vinal release only and I actually do own it but never warmed up to it.

The Boo Radleys for me started with the Kaleidoscope EP

“put your arms around me” slightly over “jimmy webb is god”. “song from the blue room” is a good tearjerker too.

I would vote for Put Your Arms but it isn't on the version I know. So I've gone for Old Newsstand. Love the horns and strings on that one

Incidentally, I've recently been toying with the idea of getting some of my favourite non-album Boos tracks pressed to two sides of vinyl.

The fact a lot of these aren't really available anymore, even online, shows we're in desperate need of expanded reissues of Wake Up and Kingsize. Learning To Walk could do with a rerelease too.

Free Huey really mars this album. I programmed an alternative Kingsize with this one swapped out for a couple of b sides and it works much much better

This album is really, really good and I have no idea what to vote for

I love Free Huey tbh - actually reminds me of late 90s Jesus Jones and I do not mean that as a criticism :)

High as Monkeys may end up my vote but I'm going to wait

I don't think I ever listened to the whole album. I bought the CD 2nd hand and I think I got to Free Huey and was like fuck this shit and turned it off. sold it years ago. but then I didn't like much else they did after Giant Steps other than a few random tracks

Got to be the title track. Exactly what Embrace aimed to achieve and couldn't come close

"The Future Is Now" is fun and all, but does it really need to be 7 minutes long? I do not miss the CD era.

Also, Free Huey is a odd choice for a lead single, given the wealth of material on this album. I was thinking this decision must have been around the same time as Blur releasing Crazy Beat, but apparently this was a full 5 years earlier.

A Boo Radleys best-of that was only composed of single A-sides would be a woefully unsatisfying listen. My guess is that Creation were constantly pestering them to write another Wake Up Boo so they'd appease them with a half-arsed attempt at something vaguely catchy and upbeat (and irritating). Never enjoyed It's Lulu, C'Mon Kids, What's In The Box or Free Huey - not least because they seem half-baked, but they really don't suit Sice's singing style at all

God, I just listened to it for the first time in ages and it's so fucking grating. It's barely a song, more like trying to parody the Chemical Brothers really really badly

From our Boo poll

like Heaven's at the Bottom of This Glass a lot as well (it's just a simple song but god I love it - pardon the pun!!), although it only finished last in my top 25. But there was a lot of competition for that last spot... There were so many great tracks from Kingsize that I had to leave out. Comb Your Hair would have been a good choice for a single indeed, but I still think that Kingsize should have been the first single. But I remember hearing a story about the making of the album a long time ago: the band had pretty much finished making the album, but Creation Records wanted to release a catchy uptempo song as the first single and there weren't any on the album, so Carr had to write Free Huey. Don't know how much of that is true, and what the source of the story was. Mr Carr himself still believes that it's a great song, and while I don't really disagree (it is a good song), the biggest problem with it is that it doesn't really fit on Kingsize in my opinion.

― Tomiboo, Saturday, April 25, 2015 10:45 AM (eight years ago)

Post starts with I.

BTW, "Free Huey" got no votes and I believe that was the only single that was shut out but could be misremembering.

Re comment above - “I didn't know Martin Carr dislikes it. What has he said about it?” (Sorry sure there’s a way to quote I’ve not figured out)

Recently found some old notes from when I interviewed Martin for student paper (oct 2020). Bad handwriting, incomplete sentences and 20 years plus of memory failure so apols for any inaccuracy but said (roughly) “It wasn’t a good time. There was lots of alcohol and drugs, and we just weren’t interested. We just hid, no one contributed much, only Tim was trying to keep it going. I was very depressed. I knew it would end half way through recording, I left and wouldn’t go back. Mark Bowen (creation a&r / later Wichita) talked me into going back.”

Sure I’ve read elsewhere that he felt rest of band weren’t really interested in contemporary music any more, that he felt he was the only one in the band not looking backwards, and that plays through in a less ambitious / boring record.

I think he's since backpedalled somewhat on not liking it though. I think probably because he's met a good number of fans who love it

I buried my mom today

Reasons for believing in anything
Are few and far between these days
And i am just a boy who can't say no
Things are so much clearer in a h

Lessons are for learning then throwing away
Experience has taught me nothing
Think i'll take a chance and miss you today
You can choose real life if you want

Blinded by the sunshine give me neon light
When i'm far away this is my home
A small one on the side to aid my flight
Then i can feel my wings begin to grow
And you don't know, so why don't give it a chance

Heaven's at the bottom of this glass

Biggups and big love Bee OK. I've always treasured your enthusiasm for this band, who, increasingly, I think of as my all time favourite band as well. Much love and empathy

Thank you, it means a lot

Now we're older, things are stranger
Then they've ever been
Now I'm scared of death
For the first time

All my friends say I look better
But my health is gone
Smoking far too much
All the time

Take your future in your own hands
Don't rush, take your time
Look around and find
Your friends

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mskgvlFYYkc

Special, special band and this album just kills me. Yes I timed this by I needed to be selfish.

*but

Put Your Arms Around Me and Tell Me "Everything's Going to Be OK"

This song inspired my username and have told this story before. I wanted to tell it again on this thread.

I was at Amoeba Records in Berkeley and saw this album to my surprise. I had no idea in 1998 that this was even coming out. I will admit I wasn't that big of a fan at first, that happened later. Finally, I saw a US copy of the record and it had one extra song on it and it was this. I debated for a long time on buying it but finally did. They had broken up by then and figured it would be the last song I ever hear by them. Around this time I started to go to message boards on the Internet. I thought since it would be the last song I hear from them that my username would be a celebration of that fact. I wanted my name to be positive and being okay fit that bill. For some reason or another I made it Bee instead of Be and here we are.

<3

there’s a good chance I bought this album at Amoeba Berkeley around that time as well, but it may have been at Mod Lang

I was going to write about "High as Monkeys," "Eurostar," "Jimmy Webb Is God," "She Is Everywhere," and "Comb Your Hair" but it has been an emotional weekend and I have said quite a bit already.

Glad to hear Martin Carr has come around on this album.

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

A Boo Radleys best-of that was only composed of single A-sides would be a woefully unsatisfying listen. My guess is that Creation were constantly pestering them to write another Wake Up Boo so they'd appease them with a half-arsed attempt at something vaguely catchy and upbeat (and irritating). Never enjoyed It's Lulu, C'Mon Kids, What's In The Box or Free Huey - not least because they seem half-baked, but they really don't suit Sice's singing style at all

― ...eh you get the gist of it (dog latin)

The single choices from Wake Up still bug me today. Reaching Out From Here is the other obvious hit on the album and I'm annoyed they went with Find The Answer Within which is easily the weakest song on the album. I like It's Lulu more, but it's such a safe choice. Twinside or Stuck On Amber would have shown a different side to the album.

I do love What's In The Box though. It's the song that got me properly into them.

I buried my mom today

― Bee OK,

Really sorry to hear this Bee. My thoughts are with agree. Totally agree with Dog Latin about your enthusiasm for this band. It makes me want to play them whenever you revive or start a post about them. There's so much 90s music I never listen to anymore, but I always come to this wonderful and misunderstood band.

That was supposed to read, my thoughts are with you..

KP, right? I don't really listen to half the 90s stuff I used to. Occasionally have a nostalgia trip into some of the alt/grunge stuff I used to like. Sometimes dig out my Blur albums, dEUS, few other things but mostly for reminiscences' sake.

The Boos are one band I liked as a teenager who I listen to on the regular, and not for nostalgic reasons but because I'm still enjoying the music and the songs still resonate with me, often in different ways from how they used to. I still listen to Giant Steps all the way through at least every couple of months. Often I go back to the early EPs or revisit Kingsize to see how I feel about it. An enduring and meaningful band in my lifetime

Shame Martin Carr signed a petition in support of JK Rowling though. Another reason to be fully behind the 3-piece reunion

wtf? noooo

more info on this?

Yeah i wasn't sure whether to post this, but it's real https://www.ipetitions.com/petition/in-solidarity-with-jk-rowling

I voted "Kingsize" as not only my favorite song on this album but one of my favorites. Always wanted to dedicate this song to my significant other one day.

Will be surprised if it doesn't walk this poll.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.