1.[album version] (5:42) 2.Slinky Love Theme (4:35) 3.She Left Me On Friday [Probemeister mix] (6:16) 4.She Left Me on Friday [Rough As "U" Like mix] (3:36)
I know it's not exactly cool to like Shed Seven - in fact it's so not cool it's almost cool again - but I've always had something of a soft spot for the lads and ended up buying all their studio albums. I didn't buy any format of this single at the time, but in the subsequent years I've ended up getting both CD versions, on separate ocaasions, for 50p each - no more than they're worth, unfortunately. This one, the receipt tells me, was obtained from WH Smith on the 16th of August 2000 alongside a kingsize Mars Bar and a copy of the NME for a total bill of £2:10.
The Heroes itself - so named, said Rick Witter at the time, to avoid confusion with the David Bowie song - was the third single from 1998's Let It Ride album. With hindsight, it's clear that Polydor had hopes for the Stephen Street-produced LP to make the band really big, and that's also reflected by the expensive packaging - a single in a proper jewel case with lyric excerpts and (relax girls) a big photo of the band looking moody on a disused train track in the booklet.
The A-side was a brave choice, not only in its running time (the radio edit wasn't included on the commercial single) but in its distance from the usual Sheds sound. It's a surprisingly effective epic, skilfully realised by Street; especially noteworthy are the drum loops, the bass in the mid-song breakdown section and John Metcalfe's string arrangement, performed by him and the rest of the Duke Strings quartet.
Don't laugh, but I firmly believe there's such a thing as a good Shed Seven B-side. Unfortunately, Slinky Love Theme isn't one of them. Any song that opens with the lyric "I sent you my love in a carrier bag" was obviously never intended as any more than a filler, and this has little to distinguish it except a brief, unexpected lurch into Love-style mariachi trumpets and acoustic guitars.
The CD is completed by remixes of their previous hit, indie-disco fave She Left Me On Friday. These (and the Adrian Sherwood mix on CD2) were advertised at the time as the first ever dance mixes of Shed Seven, and they proved to be last commercially released ones. Probemeister (who turn out to feature the drummer's brother, John Leach) supply a thumpy but less than enthralling six minute workout: the Rough As 'U' Like Mix, by drummer Alan Leach himself, sounds suspiciously like the original single version with the rhythm guitar and organ mixed out and everything else swamped in reverb.
My original instinct to wait for the album seems, alas, to have been vindicated. The band parted company with Polydor after a hits compilation, with 2001's slightly disappointing Truth Be Told album failing to reach the Top 40. They eventually called it a day in 2003, leaving behind a nine-year chart career - and how many indie bands have been and gone in those years?
ONLINE:
The band's official site is impressively fan-focused, although they do ask people not to blame their last record label for their dissolution.
Melpomene claims to be the world's first unofficial Shed 7 website, and I don't doubt it.
The unofficial discography page has artwork for both formats, although they don't seem to acknowledge the existence of vinyl.
Buy Going for Gold - the best of Shed Seven from Amazon or HMV. Go on, you know you want to.
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