| Fried | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | ||||
| Studio album by | ||||
| Released | 19 November 1984 | |||
| Genre | ||||
| Length | 40:31 | |||
| Label | Mercury | |||
| Producer | Steve Lovell | |||
| Julian Cope chronology | ||||
| ||||
| Review scores | |
|---|---|
| Source | Rating |
| AllMusic |    [2] |
| Encyclopedia of Popular Music | [3] |
| The Great Rock Discography | 7/10 [4] |
| MusicHound | 2.5/5 [5] |
| Q | [6] |
| Record Mirror | [7] |
| The Rolling Stone Album Guide | [8] |
| Select | 4/5 [9] |
Fried is the second solo album by Julian Cope.
Fried was released on 9 November 1984, [10] just six months after Cope's first solo album World Shut Your Mouth . Cope retained the guitarist Steve Lovell and the guest oboe player Kate St. John from the previous album, but added his Drayton Bassett musical foil Donald Ross Skinner on rhythm and slide guitars, the former Waterboys drummer Chris Whitten and, on one track, the former Mighty Wah! guitarist, Steve "Brother Johnno" Johnson.
The album was much more raw in approach than its predecessor. In many respects, it prefigured the looser and more mystical style which Cope would follow and be praised for in the following decade. Notoriously, the sleeve showed a naked Cope crouched on top of the Alvecote Mound slag heap clad only in a large turtle shell. [11] Song topics and approaches included early examples of Cope's subsequent tendency to mythologise his own life and connect it to legend and ritual ("Reynard the Fox" combined English folk tales with reference to Cope's notorious onstage stomach-slashing incident the previous year; "Bill Drummond Said" was an oblique fable about Cope's former manager and the future KLF mainstay) and his developing interest in paganism ("O King of Chaos", which Cope later revealed was an invocation to Odin). Several songs had little or no backing, with Cope accompanying himself.
Despite receiving better reviews than its ill-fated predecessor, Fried sold even more poorly at the time, as did the accompanying single, "Sunspots". The commercial failure of the album led to Polygram dropping Cope. He subsequently found a new manager, the artist and musician-cum-prankster Cally Callomon, and signed a new deal with Island Records. [12] Skinner and Whitten remained with Cope for the next album, Saint Julian .
Bill Drummond's 1986 album, The Man , replied in kind to "Bill Drummond Said", with a song titled "Julian Cope Is Dead".
In 2007, The Guardian included the album in their list of "1000 Albums to Hear Before You Die". [13]
All tracks are written by Julian Cope
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Reynard the Fox" | 6:14 |
| 2. | "Bill Drummond Said" | 2:28 |
| 3. | "Laughing Boy" | 5:47 |
| 4. | "Me Singing" | 3:33 |
| 5. | "Sunspots" | 5:14 |
| 6. | "The Bloody Assizes" | 3:17 |
| 7. | "Search Party" | 3:56 |
| 8. | "O King of Chaos" | 2:36 |
| 9. | "Holy Love" | 3:21 |
| 10. | "Torpedo" | 4:01 |
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 11. | "I Went on a Chourney" (Single B-side) | 2:28 |
| 12. | "Mic Mak Mok" (Single B-side) | 4:47 |
| 13. | "Land of Fear" (Single B-side) | 5:10 |
The first disc of the expanded edition contains the ten tracks from the original album.
| No. | Title | Length |
|---|---|---|
| 1. | "Land of Fear" | 5:06 |
| 2. | "Christmas Morning" (Janice Long session 12/12/1984) | 2:55 |
| 3. | "Disaster" (Janice Long session 12/12/1984) | 2:12 |
| 4. | "Mic Mak Mok" | 4:46 |
| 5. | "Pulsar" (Janice Long session 12/12/1984) | 3:33 |
| 6. | "Sunspots" (John Peel session 29/05/1984) | 2:56 |
| 7. | "Me Singing" (John Peel session 29/05/1984) | 3:32 |
| 8. | "Search Party" (John Peel session 29/05/1984) | 3:32 |
| 9. | "Crazy Farm Animal" (Janice Long session 12/12/1984) | 3:05 |
| 10. | "I Went on a Chourney" | 2:22 |
| 11. | "Hobby" (John Peel session 29/05/1984) | 1:12 |
| Chart (1984) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| UK Albums Chart [14] | 87 |
Slide guitar is a technique for playing the guitar that is often used in blues music. It involves playing a guitar while holding a hard object against the strings, creating the opportunity for glissando effects and deep vibratos that reflect characteristics of the human singing voice. It typically involves playing the guitar in the traditional position with the use of a slide fitted on one of the guitarist's fingers. The slide may be a metal or glass tube, such as the neck of a bottle, giving rise to the term bottleneck guitar to describe this type of playing. The strings are typically plucked while the slide is moved over the strings to change the pitch. The guitar may also be placed on the player's lap and played with a hand-held bar.
Echo & the Bunnymen are an English rock band formed in Liverpool in 1978. The original line-up consisted of vocalist Ian McCulloch, guitarist Will Sergeant and bassist Les Pattinson. By 1980, Pete de Freitas joined as the band's drummer.
Big in Japan were a punk band that emerged from Liverpool, United Kingdom in the late 1970s. They are better known for the later successes of their band members than for their own music.
Julian David Cope is an English musician and author. He was the singer and songwriter in Liverpool post-punk band the Teardrop Explodes and has followed a solo career since 1983 in addition to working on musical side projects such as Queen Elizabeth, Brain Donor and Black Sheep.
Crazy Horse is an American rock band best known for their association with the musician Neil Young. Since 1969, fifteen studio albums and eight live albums have been billed as being by Neil Young and Crazy Horse. They have also released six studio albums of their own between 1971 and 2009.
The Teardrop Explodes were an English post-punk/neo-psychedelic band formed in Liverpool in 1978. Best known for their Top Ten UK single "Reward", the group originated as a key band in the emerging Liverpool post-punk scene of the late 1970s. The group also launched the career of group frontman Julian Cope as well as that of keyboard player and co-manager David Balfe. Other members included early Smiths producer Troy Tate.
Time Fades Away is a 1973 live album by Canadian-American musician Neil Young. Consisting of previously unreleased material, it was recorded with the Stray Gators on the support tour following 1972's highly successful album Harvest. Due to Young's dissatisfaction with the tour, it was omitted from his catalogue and not released on compact disc until 2017. The album is the first of the so-called "Ditch Trilogy" of albums that Young recorded following the major success of Harvest, whereupon the scope of his success and acclaim became so apparent that Young subsequently experienced alienation from his music and career.
Bill Connors is an American jazz guitarist who was a member of Chick Corea's band Return to Forever. After leaving Return to Forever, he recorded three acoustic albums and then four electric albums as a leader/soloist.
Peggy Suicide is the seventh album by Julian Cope. It is generally seen as the beginning of Cope's trademark sound and approach, and as a turning-point for Cope as a maturing artist.
Zoo Records was a British independent record label formed by Bill Drummond and David Balfe in 1978. Zoo was launched to release the work of the perennially struggling Liverpool band Big in Japan. The label also released two singles by Lori and the Chameleons, a Balfe and Drummond band which they formed after Big in Japan folded. Zoo Records went on to release early work from The Teardrop Explodes and Echo & the Bunnymen. The label also released the first single, "Iggy Pop's Jacket", by the Liverpool band Those Naughty Lumps.
The Man is an album recorded and released by Scottish musician and music industry figure Bill Drummond in 1986.
World Shut Your Mouth is the debut solo album by Julian Cope, released on 17 February 1984.
Saint Julian is the third solo album by Julian Cope. It has a very strong pop sound, compared to other Cope releases, and spawned several of his best known tracks.
My Nation Underground is the fourth solo album by Julian Cope. It produced three singles including "Charlotte Anne".
Skellington is the fifth solo album by Julian Cope, released in November 1989 as a semi-official bootleg for fan club members only. Originally released on Cope's own CopeCo label, it was later reissued in March 1990 through Zippo Records.
The Stray Gators was the name given by Neil Young to his supporting musicians from 1971 to 1973 and who backed him on the albums Harvest (1972) and Time Fades Away (1973). It consisted of Jack Nitzsche (piano), Ben Keith, Tim Drummond (bass) and Kenny Buttrey (drums); the latter replaced during the Time Fades Away tour by Johnny Barbata.
20 Mothers is the twelfth solo album by Julian Cope, released in August 1995 by Echo. The album's sub-title is "Better to Light a Candle Than to Curse the Darkness".
Donald Skinner is a guitarist, songwriter and producer primarily known for his work with Julian Cope. Skinner is commonly known by the name Donald Ross Skinner with the addition of the middle name of Ross attributed to him by Cope after Glenn Ross Campbell, the pedal steel player from The Misunderstood. He is currently a guitarist for Love Amongst Ruin and DC Fontana.
"Sunspots" is a song by the English singer-songwriter Julian Cope. It is the only single released in support of his second album Fried.
