The Clang Group - Practice

The Guardian 80

(Domino)

Before becoming one of the producers who helped defined the sound of British pop in the 80s – with Madness, Dexys, Elvis Costello and more – Clive Langer had played with Deaf School, a Liverpool group who played a John the Baptist role in paving the way for punk and new wave in Liverpool.

Aged 62, he has released his first album with a new group, and picked up where Deaf School left off 40 years ago. Practice is an album that manages to combine strangeness and accessibility, spiky edges and the care you’d expect from someone who has made hit after hit after hit. Like Deaf School – and a score of those other 70s bands who knew musical change was coming, but weren’t quite sure how – the Clang Group never actually alight on a style: Practice might be grungy art rock, or off-kilter pop, or some kind of revival of proto-punk. What it is, though, is undeniably brilliant, and Langer’s voice is so rich in character that when Suggs pops up to sing Had a Nice Night, you actually miss Langer rather than being grateful a professional singer has come along. Fantastic stuff.