Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10
It seems we have become fixated with destroying the past, that the new challenges of the 21st Century are not about progression, preservation of the moments in which can bring joy, which can carry meaning, but instead warrant in the eyes of those with an alternative agenda, the possibility of starting again with an image in keeping with their own judgment, even to the point of desecration, name-calling, accusations and deceit.
It is the prerogative of the people who inhabit the period in which to call the shots, history is not set in stone, we are only presented with the ideas and views of those we listen to, history is facing a Backlash of memory, and it arguably about Time.
Whilst some revel in bringing down sacred institutions, others are finding what was once omitted is far more important to bring to the front of the stage, The Betterdays in which the public today might not be aware of, their world view skewed from top to bottom, such is politics, such is art, such is it is for the betterment of humanity that we should be aware of all that went before us and be allowed to make up our own minds on how relevant, or indeed how charming that view is.
The Betterdays, once Plymouth’s finest, in many ways still the epitome of a different time in which to try and find a home which was dominated by bands such as The Beatles, the Yardbirds and The Stones, and the American imports which went onto captivate a generation, were always going to find it difficult to co-exist. Away from the bright lights of London, the magnetic allure of Liverpool and the up-coming Birmingham revolution, Plymouth and the West Country must have felt provincial, big in your own back-yard but when up against the thought of larger dog in their own back yard, well The Betterdays, for all their exuberance and detail, understandably didn’t see their dreams come true.
It is a shame that history never records such moments after the initial rise, it is a virtue and a pleasure that the music of the band survived and The Betterdays can still tell their story, that there is life beyond the footnote to which most of us are consigned.
In Backlash, the songs, some original, a few that are outstanding covers of the songs that influenced the band at the time, have remarkably worn well, they are the secret that everybody knew but in which time regretfully forgot to keep on mentioning. Across songs such as I Can Tell, Raining In My Heart, Don’t Start Talking To Me, Howling For My Baby, Boom Boom, High Heel Sneakers, Hello Josephine, Treat Her Right, Too Much Monkey Business and Too Poor To Die, what comes across is a heart and soul that knew it was never going to be truly left behind, that Time was not yet done with The Betterdays, that whilst all around is being challenged and re-written to suit a new age, there are still moments in which we wrestle to preserve, and the memory of The Betterdays is certainly one, as this compilation album more than insists, that must be more than remembered, it should be added to the fuel of persistent cool of the period.
Ian D. Hall