Dave's 500 Bus Albums No 16 - The Playn Jayn "Five Good Evils" (1985)

Back in the late '80s when I lived in Loughborough, I was lent a single by a guy called "Troll". Troll was a leading light in the Loughborough music scene, regularly hosting Psychedlic discos and all-nighters.

The single was a white label promo and Troll told me it was by a band called "The Playn Jayn" and to see what I thought. I thought it was alright. The two tracks were "Mezcal" and "Chamber Door" and they were a weird mix of rockabilly rhythms, jangly psychedelic guitars and yelping vocals. At the time I probably would have labelled it as "psycho-Goth".

Fast forward 20 years and I've still got those two tracks, digitised to mp3 from my original cassette recording of Troll's single. One day I start looking around the internet to see exactly who The Playn Jayn are. It turns out "were" is a better verb. The Playn Jayn formed in 1983 and split probably about 3 years later, after releasing a studio album (Five Good Evils), a live album (Friday the 13th) recorded at the Marquee in London, and a single (Juliette).

The LPs are as rare as hen's teeth (although the live album is a bit easier to get hold of), and you're looking at vinyl here as they were never (and probably never will be) released on CD.

I now have both on vinyl and what a shame that this is all there is! I guess if you wanted to label The Playn Jayn then "80's Neo Psychedelia" would fit. Part of the early-mid 80s Psychedelic Revivial, the nearest bands I can compare them to are those from the US "Paisley Underground" scene of the same time - Dream Syndicate, Long Ryders, Rain Parade. You can hear the same early 60s US Garage influence in their music, but The Playn Jayn played it faster and more up-tempo, bringing them a good live following. Unfortunately this didn't translate to record sales, and the band called it a day a few years later.

Listening to them now, it's easy to see that the Playn Jayn would have gone down a storm during "Britpop" in the early 90s. Sadly they were 5 years too early.

If you want to hear what The Playn Jayn sounded like, do a search on youtube for either "Playn Jayn Juliette" or "Playn Jayn I Love You Like I Love Myself"