I can never understand why Gemma Hayes isn’t better known. Such a great voice, a terrific songwriter, and a thoroughly lovely person, an absolute sweetheart when you meet her. If ever anyone deserved to be huge, it’s Gemma.
I’ve seen TalkTalk mentioned; they had several really big hits, but Mark Hollis and the rest of the band were almost wilfully uncommercial, going out of their way to make successive albums that had less and less commercial appeal, with long tracks having long periods of silence in them. Hollis’s solo album is incredibly difficult to listen to, you never know just when he’s actually going to sing, which makes you really twitchy.
Several bands that should have been better known, and some had a fair degree of radio one support; The Slingbacks, Linoleum, Nut, Drugstore, Screaming Trees, Scheer, and The Julie Dolphin.
Oh, and The Blue Nile were on 6Music with RadMac this week.
Dead Can Dance have a new album out as well.