Foxdude Records

Marden Hill - el label Discography.

    7 Curtain/Let’s Make Shane & Mackenzie (Gpo 18)                             11-86
    7 Robe/Hangman (Gpo 30)                                                     10-87
   10 Oh Constance/The Execution Of Emperor Maximillian/
       Bar Room Fly (Gpo 36t)                                                   03-88
   LP Cadaquez (El - Acme 13)
       Masque/Oh Constance/Robe/Anthem/What All The Fuss About?/
       Bacchus Is Back/Curtain/Satellite/The Execution Of Emperor
       Maxillian/South From Paris/Constance from Cadaquez/Bar Room
       Fly/Citadel.
Tracks on original el Compliations :
LP V/A "London Pavilion" (El - Acme 7)
    - Marden Hill track = "Curtain"
LP V/A "London Pavilion Volume 2" (El - Acme 10)
    - Marden Hill track = "Masque"
LP V/A "Resist (if you can) the lure of Girl Talk" (El - Acme 20)
    - Marden Hill track = "Curtain"
LP V/A "London Pavilion Volume 3" (El - Acme 21)
    - Marden Hill track = "Satellite"

Marden Hill On él 1986-1989.

The main reason for choosing Marden Hill to appear on the Foxdude Records Web-site is because without knowing it this band managed to completely alter our perception of records. Where once we were record buyers we, after hearing Marden Hill, became record collectors. This state has since ensured that we have gathered more indie records than is probably healthy.

What did this band do?

Well they began a personal trend of collecting records on a particular labels.

After one listen of the LP "Cadaquez" I made the immediate decision that everything on the él label must be consumed and with haste. So from then fourth an adventure began which to this very day is not complete as there are still original él records out there that I have yet to find and there are many other labels which I still have to purchase before my record collection becomes anywhere near complete!

Although Marden Hill have recorded some very fine releases since their él period (the Blown Away album, Melt On, Sugarplums and various appearances on compilations) I have restricted this article to just the band’s él releases mainly for collectable reasons. Firstly, this is a record collecting web-site and secondly, if I wrote about the all the music that we at Foxdude think should be more collectable than it presently is then I would be writing for ever.

In the traditional sense, the Marden Hill of the late 80’s can not, I think, be considered an indie act however their label él was in every sense a true indie as it was highly individualistic. It also paid absolutely no attention to record sales and so gained the true mark of an indie! Since él ceased much has been said about the label but the fact remains that whilst it existed virtually no-one (in the UK anyway) bought the records and no-one really thought it was particularly cool to like the label. Fashion changes of course and now the ideas of labels specialising in cool packaging, design motifs and more genre based music have returned so the 1980’s ideas of él's managing director - Mr Mike Always have really struck a chord. This can be seen in releases of recent indie labels like Siesta, Elefant, and Poptones especially.

Back in the mid 1980’s however all this was new. The manner in which a record was packaged was seen mostly as a tacky marketing tool (listen to the Smiths "Paint A Vulgar Picture" from the "Strangways" LP to understand what I mean). So, in this environment Mike Alway created a label that sold itself on it's packaging and at the time I was captivated. Marden’s Hill "Cadaquez" LP reflected not only the style that él was trying to cater for but also the musical content. Musically it is beautiful collection of bar-room jazz interlocked with 1950’s swing-time rhythms that simply ooze style. In other words everything that the él label was about.

For collecting reasons all the singles are worth owning as they all contain tracks not released on the album, for instance the version of "Bar-Room Fly" on the Oh Constance 10 inch EP is different from the LP version.