Manchild - Neneh Cherry

This 12" single was a bit of a gamble: a rap artist who by chance had made a reasonable track, remixed by a triphop band that had made a reasonable track as well. Unfortunately, all this didn't add up: the remixes on this disc are not very interesting at all.

Also, while I thought this 12" was quite rare, it turns out it is offered on discogs.com for less than 5 euros. Sometimes you're less lucky with a gamble than you think.

My collection: 12" single no. 291
Found: Record Exchange, London, October 1993
Cost: 2 pounds
Tracks: 'Manchild (Massive attack remix)', 'Manchild (Massive Attack bonus beats)' / 'Manchild (Smith n Mighty remix)', 'Manchild (More bass less vocal style)'

Be thankful - Massive Attack

Massive Attack had two hit singles in 1991, 'Unfinished sympathy' and 'Safe from harm'. They followed this up in early 1992 with 'Be thankful', the fourth and last single from their debut album 'Blue lines'. This proved to be a very unsuccessful release, as it only reached number 49 in the Australian singles chart, while failing to chart everywhere else.

I bought this single out of curiosity and because of the fact that the shop didn't have much else to buy. Sometimes I had this mood where I just had to buy cheap singles, and when there's nothing much on offer, I tend to buy whatever I think might be good. And this was, well, reasonably good.

My collection: 7" single no. 2251
Found: Disco Market, Den Haag, March 4, 1995
Cost: 1 guilder
Tracks: 'Be thankful (Paul Oakenfold mix)' / 'Hymn of the big wheel (Nellee Hooper mix)'

Unfinished sympathy - Massive

The group Massive Attack was only just becoming better known with their first hit single 'Unfinished sympathy', when the Gulf War started and anything slightly offensive was censored by the powers that be. So 'Attack' was dropped from the band's name for a while. (After all, as long as we're waging wars, we shouldn't really talk about it, should we?)

'Unfinished sympathy' featured vocals by Shara Nelson and is usually named as one of the first tracks to bring the 'triphop' genre to the mainstream. The single reached number 13 in the UK singles chart and number 1 in the Dutch Top 40.

My collection: 7" single no. 1428
Found: Free Record Shop, Den Haag, April 13, 1991
Cost: 6 guilders
Tracks: 'Unfinished sympathy' / 'Unfinished sympathy (Nellee Hooper 7" mix)'