No sleeves, no problem: getting funky with naked singles

'We thought disco was fucking dead / But now it's back inside my head' - Thee Headcoats

I've said before on this blog that I'm pretty much agnostic when it comes to musical formats. They're all good - providing what they contain is good. CDs, CD-Rs, original tapes, dubbed tapes, minidiscs, MP3s, WAVs, streaming, even er, vinyl records: bring 'em on. Hence, the recent fetishisation of all things vinyl has left me cold. Fuck your Strictly Vinyl DJing, you fathead. Yeah, I'm happy with any and all formats but when I'm scouring the charity shops of London on the lookout for ... stuff, I must admit that even I usually draw the line at one particular type of musical product. Which one? Well, this one: 

Look away now audiophiles: eight 7" singles in search of a record sleeve

Yep, old 45s with no sleeves whatsoever. No paper/cardboard sleeve and certainly no protective plastic (polythene) sleeves. The lowest of the low. These sad little things usually lurk at the bottom of a shop's messy container of records, looking like they're there by mistake. Occasionally I might have a quick glance through a few of these, though invariably they're terrible. True, one time I found a sleeveless copy of the Sex Pistols' Something Else. Out of curiosity I asked the bloke at the counter about it - How much is this? Er, there's no sleeve - and, looking all confused (or just bored?), the guy said, "Oh, you can have that if there's no sleeve". How nice. Anyway, aside from a one-off "Sid Sings"-era SPs single, I generally steer clear of these "naked" records. They're going to be badly damaged, right? Scratched to fuck is the technical term. In the past, whenever I've tentatively picked up a bunch of sleeveless singles I've generally noticed a mass of scuff marks and ominous-looking scratches. Sometimes actual splits in the vinyl. Essentially, they look like musical junk. Or so I've always thought. Except today, in one of my local charity shops, after dropping off some of my own stuff (yeah, it works both ways), I found myself idly skimming through a big wooden box of sleeveless singles. There must have been 40-50 - quite a lot, all in one place. And only 25p ("Four for £1"). No, forget it, I thought. They'll be too damaged. Well, reader, you can guess the rest. I took the plunge with eight singles from what was mostly a bunch of '70s disco and funk. A few years ago, I actually bought about 800 singles all in one go from a friend of a friend, and most of these were also '70s disco and funk, so ... er, I obviously have a weakeness for mass-purchasing this type of music. Turns out (yeah, you're ahead of me again) they all play fine. Every one of the eight. No jumps, no pops, a little (but not much) surface noise and, most important of all, this is pretty good music. Check it out (Mixcloud stream here, player below):

1: Peter Brown, Do you wanna get funky with me?

2: DC LaRue, Ca-the-drals
3: The Reprobates, Participation two
4: Brecker Brothers, Sneakin' up behind you
5: Munich Machine, Get on the funk train
6: Intruders, I'll always love my mama
7: Smiley Culture, Police officer 
8: Ohio Players, Skin tight

9: Peter Brown, Burning love breakdown

Classic disco from the Intruders, discofied funk from Peter Brown and DC LaRue, more straight-ahead funk from the Brecker Brothers and the Ohio Players, future-disco from Munich Machine (produced by Giorgio Moroder and Pete Bellotte), the interesting dub-disco of the Peter Brown b-side Burning Love Breakdown, and - bonus - the amazing Smiley Culture, with his funny-brilliant Police Officer and a fantastic dub version by the The Reprobates. Having mocked the police with this unforgettable record, Smiley Culture would later die in disputed circumstances during a police raid on his home. RIP Smiley Culture.