Posts Tagged ‘Dave Kusworth’

The HAWKS – ” Obviously Five Believers “

Posted: August 29, 2021 in MUSIC
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The Hawks were a shortlived UK band led by Stephen Duffy and Dave Kusworth and formed in 1979. Duffy had just quit Duran Duran (he was their original lead singer) and was approached about starting a new group by Kusworth (still a few years from forming Jacobites with Nikki Sudden), whose band TV Eye had just broken up. With TV Eye members David Twist and Paul Adams, as well as ex Duran Duran bassist Simon Colley rounding out the line-up, the band were formed and originally went by Obviously 5 Believers (named for a Dylan song), before changing their name to The Subterranean Hawks which was then shortened to just The Hawks.

The Hawks rehearsed constantly, creating a tough yet sensitive sound that was somewhere between Sniff ‘N’ The Tears and Felt. They played live when not rehearsing, gaining a small but rabid following, and released their debut single, “Words of Hope,” in 1980. They broke up not long after, unfortunately, leaving the rest of their material in the practice space. Those practices were recorded, however, and the dozens of tapes sat in a box in Duffy’s house unopened as he went on to lead groups TinTin and The Lilac Time and later a solo career. In 2019, Duffy and Kunsworth met for lunch, caught up, and Duffy promised to dig out The Hawks tapes and release them. Kusworth passed away in 2020 but Duffy has made good on his promise, and here we have the band’s debut album, 40 years after breaking up.

Duffy has said that The Hawks didn’t make demos — “we played live and I sang over the top, just to see what we sounded like” — and refers to these tapes as “field recordings,” but the 10 songs on Obviously 5 Believers show a band that seemed to have it all figured out. A bunch of them seem ready to go: “Bullfighter” is muscular power pop worthy of The Only Ones or The Soft Boys, “All the Sad Young Boys” predates The Smiths’ mopey glamour, and “Big Store” is swaggering and effete a la The Monochrome Set. Other songs are rougher around the edges, and many clearly sound like cassettes that have been stuffed in a drawer for 40 years but that doesn’t make the music any less compelling. The Hawks sound vital and alive on these recordings and it will leave you wanting more and wondering what might have been.

DAVE KUSWORTH – Passes away at the Age Of 60 Years Old

Posted: September 21, 2020 in MUSIC
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Legendary Birmingham rock n roller who was more Keef than Keef, Dave Kusworth has died at the age of 60. With his hats and scarves he epitomised the rock n roll glimmer twins dream but he could back it up with an immense gift for melodic song writing couched in the guitar strewn rock n roll of the Jacobites with Nikki Sudden in the early eighties or eventually on his own trail of great records.

Dave Kusworth, of Jacobites, TV Eye, Rag Dolls and other groups, has died at age 60. Details are scarce, but partner Anouschkat Elspass confirmed the sad new via Kusworth’s Facebook, writing, “I am heartbroken Dave the Love of my life, my soulmate, my lover and best friend has passed away in his sleep.”

Jacobites were formed by Nikki Sudden and Kusworth when their bands, Swell Maps and the Subterranean Hawks, broke up. (Sudden’s brother and Swell Maps drummer Epic Soundtracks was also in Jacobites.) Co-leading the band, Jacobites’ music was full of warm, romantic swagger, owing to Rolling Stones, Dylan and Velvet Underground. (Around the same time, Kusworth also played briefly played in glam rock band The Dogs D’Amour.) Jacobites‘ mid-’80s albums were originally released on UK label Glass but Twin-Tone released a best-of 1986, and Numero Group reissued their classic 1984 self-titled debut and 1985’s Robespierre’s Velvet Basement in 2013.

When Jacobites ended Kusworth continued to make records on his own with The Bounty Hunters and The Tenterhooks. Nikki Sudden died in 2006, and Epic Soundtracks died in 1997.

Read tributes to Dave from Teenage Fanclub’s Norman Blake, The Auteurs’ Luke Haines, The Lilac Time and more — and listen to some classic Jacobites

The Lilac Time said We’ve been compiling an album from old cassettes of songs from back then so the young Dave Kusworth has been with me this summer. So it’s heartbreaking to hear he has gone. Love to his family friends and fans sdx
Luke Haines : Really sad to hear of the passing of Dave Kusworth. Nikki Sudden and his brother Epic Soundtracks both gone. Kevin Junior also. True poets all.

The JACOBITES – ” Old Scarlett “

Posted: June 29, 2017 in CLASSIC ALBUMS, MUSIC
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Image of JACOBITES - Old Scarlett LP - Out 7th July - PRE-ORDER NOW!

The Jacobites were an English rock band formed initally in Birmingham in 1982 by Nikki Sudden and Dave Kusworth, following the breakup of their respective previous bands, the Swell Maps and the Subterranean Hawks.

Sudden and Kusworth were both strongly influenced by The Faces, Dylanand Glam Rock, and, most vitally, The Rolling Stones their open worship of the group (Kusworth’s entire body of work would later be described as “A tear-stained meeting of Johnny Thunders meets, the Rolling Stones “Wild Horses” era and Neil Young’s “Down By The River” wrapped in scarves, and bound up in velvet jackets, leather pants, and shrouded by cigarette smoke while Sudden called the Stones “the best band there has ever been” and was working on a Ronnie Wood bio at the time of his death), The band combined velvet-and-scarves style of dressing and their girls-and-drugs style of living,

The Jacobites reissue of “Old Scarlett” (1995) is released for the first time on Vinyl format! The band featured Nikki Sudden & Dave Kusworth it is probably their greatest love & death songs collection. An essential band! The Release contains a poster (30 x 60 cm) Out 7th July on You Are The Cosmos Records.

Image of JACOBITES - Old Scarlett LP - Out 7th July - PRE-ORDER NOW!

NIKKI SUDDEN & DAVE KUSWORTH – ” Shame For The Angels E.P ” Record Store Day Release 2017

Posted: April 22, 2017 in MUSIC
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• Limited edition of 500 copies on purple vinyl for Record Store Day 2017 • This e.p was originally issued in 1984 and has been out of print since 1986 over 30 years ago • The tracks on this record remained exclusive to this e.p and were never included in the ‘Jacobites ‘ 2 albums • This version has been re mastered for vinyl only and is issued in the original sleeve artwork by Dave Twist

Side One: 1. Shame for The Angels 2. Fortune of Fame Side Two: 1.Heart of Hearts 2.Ratcliffe Highway

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RECORD STORE DAY IS THIS SATURDAY!

NIKKI SUDDEN & DAVE KUSWORTH – ” Shame For The Angels “

Posted: September 12, 2016 in MUSIC
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one of the many (and always brilliant) sides of Nikki Sudden with this first single of what will next become The Jacobites.

Nikki Sudden & Dave Kusworth – Shame for the Angels EP (Pawn Hearts Records, 1984)

It was released on Pawn Hearts, a tiny label that only did one other single – AED’s Infer Ships Sink – and one of the reasons it was such a tiny label is because Nikki nicked the tapes and gave them to Dave Barker,

First 7″ release of Jacobites..a little treasure…whith a classic themes: Shame for the Angels, a first version of Fortune of Fame (original theme from Rag Dolls), etc… Epic on drums, maracas, organ, tambourine, backing vocals, feedback…