The Burning Up Times - Strangled.co.uk

Burning Up Times Issue 3
Pyros Chronos ponders a rare peach –
Go Buddy Gone
HAVE YOU NOTICED the number
of Stranglers’ listings on Ebay
described as ‘rare’? The scarcity
prefi x (‘uber-rare’ too!) can lure the eyes,
but the hype is not always what it seems.
According to Record Collector, ‘Peaches
& Go Buddy Go’ with the original
“Blackmail” sleeve art is in the ultra-rare
category. This is due in part, to it’s below
par artwork.
The Stranglers’ second single of 1977
features Chris Gabrin’s earthy shot of
the band with Kevin Sparrow’s brilliant
logo. So far, so good. The titular lettering
– ‘Punked-up’ in blackmail demand format
– is fi ne, on a Sex Pistols’ record! UA’s
schoolboy marketing ploy to align with
the summer’s biggest popular culture
phenomenon fell fl at, and the men from
Del Monte… sorry, The Stranglers, said
no to it. UA agreed, and all they had to do
was cast the pressed-up copies towards the
direction of the pressing plant burner. It is
thought one member of staff alone stashed
their very own cache of fi fteen
copies, and today, it is believed there
are somewhere between 20 and 25 in
circulation worldwide. Such low numbers
obviously means big money is exchanged,
and value depends on the price anyone is
prepared to pay. But if the successful EBay
sale last January is anything to go by, it’s
worth a staggering… wait for it… £800!.
A September 2007 sale saw 17 bids over
10 days where it fi nally went for £151.
A piece of plastic worth that
amount of hard-earned cash is beyond
comprehension for many of us who, fi rst
time round, settled for whatever our
record shop had. In my case, it was the
plain white paper sleeve. Checking my old
collection of 45’s reveals two in the plain,
and three from the second pressing, which
feature a glossy card cover and a shot of
a juicy looking peach with a pair of pink
undercrackers being yanked by a fruity
male digit. Five copies of the same tune
makes me think I wore them all out one
by one, although one particular platter has
the added quirk of an extra label lightly
stuck over the fi rst. Offers, anyone?
Let’s not forget this track was Top
10 in ’77 and while it included the word
‘bummer’, it also undoubtedly fanned
the fl ames of misogynistic indictments
with its gynaecological reference too. The
fi ltered radio-play edit comes with an
accompanying sticker declaring ‘Catalogue
number for commercial copies is UP
36248’ – a snip at £500 – plain sleeve or
colour. Sadly, all fi ve of my Peaches are
not for transmission, so the drinks are
not on me. Other rarely spotted oddities
elsewhere on the ’net include New
Zealand’s plain ‘Festival’ sleeve (K 6830)
which, although it doesn’t warrant much
money, £80 has been known to exchange
hands for its German counterpart (UA
36248AT) with its Punk-looking sleeve
featuring a solitary Strangler; a chuckling
JJ in onstage mayhem. Very Punk. A Dutch
version went on sale late 2007 as well.
Unfortunately for the seller, the ‘Buy It
Now’ option for £125 was not taken up by
shrewd Ebayers.
That’s all I can say on Peaches, apart
from a Paul-sung resurrection in 2004
which backed the Big Thing Coming
single. Recorded two years prior, a
management promo appeared at the time
with a typo of the producer’s surname
– Wallis instead of Wallace, in the credits.
Post Norfolk Coast also saw EMI’s
compilation, ‘Peaches, The Very Best of
The Stranglers’, which obviously included
Peaches, and just in time for Fathers’ Day
too. It has been said The Stranglers have
issued unsubtle record sleeves, whereas
here, EMI show a shot of an open can
of peaches which serves to defi ne the
meaning of the song on another level.
And in 2007, the song lives on: dance act
the Dub Pistols release their own version
of Peaches with updated colloquialisms
in 21st Century vernacular – but minus
bummer and clitoris.
References: Internet; Record Collector
(2002) No. 270; The story of the original
peaches sleeve. (1994) Strangled Vol. 2
No. 14.
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