My mum was Anglo-Indian, she grew up in Calcutta with an Indian mother and a British father and they had a huge family. Ten or eleven brothers and sisters and all the aunts, uncles, cousins and nephews that comes along with that. And a good chunk of that family lived in or around London so I grew up tolerating huge family get-togethers, regular trips to Southall to shop, eating curries and hearing music that was different to the music I liked. Cornershop were a band that made the indie guitar music I liked but in amongst it were the sounds of those family get togethers or those trips to Southall.
“When I Was Born for the 7th Time” made it to my best albums of 1997 list but I very rarely listen to it these days while it probably didn’t deserve that accolade I’ve enjoyed listening to it a lot more than I expected I would
There are gems…”Sleep on the Left Side” is a fantastic opener, the moment when Paula Frazer arrives in “Good to Be on the Road Back Home” is almost perfect “make way for a lady”, and I love “Norwegian Wood” ever if it does have a slightly tacked-on-the-end-as-an-afterthought feel. Brimful of Asha hasn’t yet been ruined by over-familiarity and that Norman Cook remix…here’s the proof…