Flaming Stars-Leader Max Decharne äußert sich zum neuen Album auf der Ace/Big Beat-Website:
Following on from our double CD collection “London After Midnight – Singles, Rarities & Bar Room Floor Fillers 1995-2005” – released in May 2006 and covering the highlights of our career for the now defunct vinyl Japan label, “Born Under A Bad Neon Sign” is our first new studio album for Ace. Recorded between March and May this year at Ed Deegan’s Gizzard Studio in East London, it features thirteen songs, including a very special guest appearance (singing a duet on the title track) by our old friend Holly Golightly. Sometime around 1998, I sang a duet with Holly on one of her singles, and we’re delighted that she came along for a return engagement with us. In the entire 133 tracks which we’ve released since 1995, she’s the only person apart from the band members who’s ever appeared on one of our recordings.
Ed Deegan, who recorded and mixed the album, has been working with us at various times since 1995 – we made a couple of albums with him at Toe Rag Studio and his Gizzard Studio is set up very much along the same lines. Our method of making an album has never really changed – seven or eight days of recording followed by two or three more for the mix, and try to capture everything as live as possible.
What does it sound like? Good Question…. There’s some 60’s garage ‘Senator McCarthy’s Paranoid Witch Hunt Blues’, some kind of Russian/ East German love song ‘Treptower Park’, a Pinetop Smith meets Martin Rev boogie number ‘All The Same To Me’, a southern soul-style ballad ‘Too late To Turn Back’ Too Early To Say Goodbye’ and of course the title duet ‘Born Under A Bad Neon Sign’, a hard-luck romance set to French 60’s background. I could go on, but I won’t…
By Max Décharné (lead vocals and keyboards, The Flaming Stars)
Don’t forget to check out Max’s latest book as well: King’s Road: The Rise and Fall of the Hippest Street in the World (Weidenfeld & Nicolson)