Wire "154" - Why is it so hard to find?

**zombywoof** · 02-26-2016

Hi everyone! This has been recommended to me several times but I can't seem to find an affordable copy in this country. What's the deal?

**zravkapt** · 02-26-2016

Didn't know it's so hard to find but it's fucking awesome!

**zombywoof** · 02-26-2016

Originally Posted by zravkapt

Didn't know it's so hard to find but it's fucking awesome!

Maybe that's why, it's good and everyone snapped up a copy.

**Steve F.** · 02-26-2016

Because sales of older releases on hard media are so down that it is no longer financially worthwhile to keep them in print.

**rcarlberg** · 02-26-2016

Available at Amazon starting at $8.94.

**polmico** · 02-26-2016

Yeah, I was going to say Amazon has it, but it's rather a bummer that Wire's online shop doesn't have it.

Steve is probably right. We should give up the ghost.

Alternatively, you could listen to more XTC and buy some Gang of Four albums.

**zombywoof** · 02-26-2016

Originally Posted by rcarlberg

Available at Amazon starting at $8.94.

Used - acceptable.

I bought it on Amazon and it's been a month and it still hasn't shipped.

**zombywoof** · 02-26-2016

Originally Posted by polmico

Alternatively, you could listen to more XTC and buy some Gang of Four albums.

That's a good call, don't know Gang of Four.

**Steve F.** · 02-26-2016

Originally Posted by zombywoof

That's a good call, don't know Gang of Four.

OH, FUCKIN' YEAH.

Most folks like Entertainment best. I'm a Solid Gold man, myself.

Either of those two is da schnitzel.

The best UK 'punk' band of the 70s in my mind.

**Steve F.** · 02-26-2016

Uncle Steve says buy this NOW!

http://www.amazon.com/Solid-Gold-Ano...our+solid+gold

**zombywoof** · 02-26-2016

Originally Posted by Steve F.

Uncle Steve says buy this NOW!

http://www.amazon.com/Solid-Gold-Ano...our+solid+gold

Done! Maybe that Wire thing will show eventually, but this is like, IN STOCK, man!

**Steve F.** · 02-26-2016

Hot, great, white funk rhythm section, SMART lyrics, and the best, noisiest guitarist of the punk era. IMO.

**polmico** · 02-26-2016

Small story time (and the reason Gang of Four is in my mind today). Feel free to skip. I rarely indulge in posts, but I guess tonight's the night as Mr. Young would say. So pardons are due in advance. This will still be brief and totally skippable.

My AP Lang students recently finished reading The Great Gatsby. I go back and forth with how much fiction to include in this course. It really is a rhetoric introduction course (or Comp 101 from your college years), and I know I should be less sentimental and basically cut novels from it. Meh. Fitz's hyperbolic, convoluted and just plain bizarro prose is worth studying alongside politic speeches and Emersonian essays. That drunk knew how to exaggerate and prettify a goddamn sentence. It's "dull gold" indeed, ain't it?

Anyway. The teenagers just finished their Gatsby essays and turned them in with all their teenage hopes and teenage dreams and teenage hang ups. Typically, there were problems, and I seek to rectify problems if nothing else.

How, says I, can I get these teenagers to analyze rhetoric coherently? Undoubtedly they sit in their teenage bedrooms and ponder the very same thoughts at night. Rhetoric, thinks them, is something that needs be gotten.

Naturally, I ponder all this while listening to music during my break. And it strikes me that one's impressions of a piece of music can shed light on how to analyze a text. Genius. I knew I done became a professional Englisher for a reason.

I type the lesson up with the thought of using some spiritual, uplifting and weighty song. Thoughts center around The Beatles and I eventually settle on Lennon's "Imagine." Parallel structure, says I. Easy to identify musical themes, says I. Oh boy. I'm feeling smart. Englishing is quite awesome.

Then "Paralyse" comes on the headphones. And, duh, Gang of Four's minimalist rant against government and their sparse playing and that giant pause in the middle of the song comes together right now into a lesson on how to differentiate between summarization, opinion and analysis.

Thanks, King and Co. Your hatred for capitalistic culture sure did save my ass today.

The kids and I listened to Gang of Four today. They didn't like the song, but they might've figured out how to analyze the pretty words of a raving drunk.

**Steve F.** · 02-26-2016

^ ^ ^

<big like inserted here>

**Sunlight Caller** · 02-26-2016

Originally Posted by zombywoof

Used - acceptable.

I bought it on Amazon and it's been a month and it still hasn't shipped.

50% of everything I order on Amazon fails to arrive, I've given up on them now, I totally hate this company.

154 must be available on a stream somewhere, just try and give it a listen, it's special. Have you found Pink Flag and Chairs Missing?

As for Gang of Four, I love them too, Entertainment is wonderful. I haven't heard Solid Gold in ages, I only have the vinyl, but must pull it out. And spin it Their Peel Sessions disc is worth getting too.

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**rcarlberg** · 02-26-2016

Originally Posted by Sunlight Caller

50% of everything I order on Amazon fails to arrive, I've given up on them now, I totally hate this company.

Seriously? I've had MAYBE one or two items fail to arrive, out of 916 orders in the past decade -- and I got refunds on them.

**zombywoof** · 02-26-2016

Originally Posted by Sunlight Caller

50% of everything I order on Amazon fails to arrive, I've given up on them now, I totally hate this company.

154 must be available on a stream somewhere, just try and give it a listen, it's special. Have you found Pink Flag and Chairs Missing?

As for Gang of Four, I love them too, Entertainment is wonderful. I haven't heard Solid Gold in ages, I only have the vinyl, but must pull it out. And spin it Their Peel Sessions disc is worth getting too.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

My Amazon order came with the option to download MP3s. Trouble is, I really, really hate MP3s. Compression, compression, compression.

I bought that Gang of Four album per Steve and Polmico's suggestion.

PS - you sound like an awesome teacher

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**Calabasas_Trafalgar** · 02-27-2016

110 copies on Discogs.

**Sunlight Caller** · 02-27-2016

Originally Posted by rcarlberg

Seriously? I've had MAYBE one or two items fail to arrive, out of 916 orders in the past decade -- and I got refunds on them.

Seriously. It was never like this before but the last six months have been awful. It isn't just recorded music, a guitar and amp I bought for a teens Christmas present was cancelled and refunded, amongst other bits and pieces. I put it down to a lazy courier who won't drive out to the country, I live in a small village. Amazon don't give a fuck though, I complain and they send me the same response every single time.

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**Sunlight Caller** · 02-27-2016

Originally Posted by zombywoof

PS - you sound like an awesome teacher

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Ah I'm sure I would be but I never had they calling! My recently departed Mum though was an awesome teacher. Polmico takes that credit.

**zombywoof** · 02-27-2016

Originally Posted by Sunlight Caller

Ah I'm sure I would be but I never had they calling! My recently departed Mum though was an awesome teacher. Polmico takes that credit.

Oops, sorry. This why we never 'wine and PE', friends.

**polmico** · 02-27-2016

Thanks for the kind words, guys.

Ian, let us know what you think of Gang of Four.

And as far as Wire goes? If you can't get 154, get the rest of it. I like all phases of the band and consider their latest run of albums among their best.

**Mister Triscuits** · 02-27-2016

Ian, if Amazon continues to be unable to fill your order, PM me--I have a "gently used" copy I'd be willing to sell.

**pb2015** · 02-27-2016

If all else fails there was a compilation titled On Returning released in the late 80's that included a large sampling of Pink Flag, Chairs Missing and 154. That is on Amazon too, cheaper.