1000 Albums Project

ALBUM 314

Live at the Tidy Weekender 2, by Tidy Boys
Suggested by Craig Scott

I’ll not be dwelling on this.

Apparently, Tidy Boys are pioneers of the Hard House electronic dance sound. Formed by Amadeus Mozart (I presume that’s not his real name) and Andy Pickles (I presume that is), they operate on the Tidy Trax label, and their first release was The Handbaggers – U Found Out, which allegedly placed at 55 in the UK charts.

Tidy Boys aren’t musicians, or even an act as such. They are a Hard House Clubbing Brand, putting on large-scale clubbing events called the Tidy Weekenders, three-day parties held on Friday through Sunday at Pontins resorts in Prestatyn, Camber Sands and Southport.

I couldn’t give any less of a toss.

I mean, Pontins?

“Scream for me, Camber Sands!”

“Come on Prestatyn, make some noise!”

They’ve released a slew of live albums from the Tidy Weekenders, capturing their dance sets in all their poundiant and throbulous glory, full of the hum of the ecstatic crowd and the fizz of the smoke machine. And I use the words “ecstatic crowd” very deliberately. The albums all look the same, and I presume they all sound the same too. That may be uncharitable of me, but I couldn’t give a tinker’s fig. This scene needs to get in the f**king sea.

I hate live albums. I hate dancing. I hate clubbing.

This is literally nails down my blackboard spine, the grinding of teeth through a mouthful of sharding glass. It’s what they’d play as aural torture to extract information from me, and after twenty minutes I’d tell them anything they wanted.

There’s nothing to it. Nothing at all. It’s a beat, and samples, and people moving, on and on to the horizon, no intrigue, no depth, nothing. It calls to a part of me that’s long dead, if in fact it was ever a part of me at all. I’ve no nostalgia for the scene, for the sound, for the people. It’s music for people I’d likely hate, by people I’d likely hate, in venues I’d definitely hate, and everything is also on drugs.

I was almost ready to declare my first 0/10, and review with no standout track, but the final spasm It’s Over The Line – Mixed – The Tidy Boys ‘Home Made’ Remix had a sample from Ricky Gervais in it. Not a good sample, mind. Just his voice. So that’s the highlight.

Live at Tidy Weekender 2 gets 1/10, because I recognised some of the non-musical samples. This is exactly the sort of rote and depressing poison than made me give up on music in the late Nineties.

And Pontins! It’s not even Butlins.

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