#65 – Breaking Down at My Door

Breaking Down At My Door (Live, Hallamshire Hotel, Sheffield, March 1985)
Breaking Down At My Door at Pulpwiki

Were it not for the tape recorder secreted somewhere in the Hallamshire Hotel on the 28th of March 1985, Breaking Down At My Door would most likely be lost to history, along with a barely audible two-part spoken word piece called ‘Tilly’s Story’ by Mark Tillbrook. And, to be frank, neither would’ve been a great loss to the world.

All we have here is the same note thrashed out for eight bars, and the same eight bars repeated for three minutes – the only progression being that Jarvis starts out shouting excitedly and ends up shouting furiously, and that Magnus beats his drums in an more aggressive manner. Oh, and there’s a bit where Jarvis asks “can someone turn up the microphone please?” It’s all a bit of a mess, a ham-fisted attempt at making a punk ‘Sister Ray’ that just ends up as a mindless, pointless thrash.

This is no ‘Silence’ though. While it’s certainly nothing special, it does have a certain energy and passion to it, and lacks anything truly grating or pretentious. Soon Pulp would be drawing on motorik rhythms and hypnotic drones in a much more interesting way – and Breaking Down At My Door, in its own small way, is a start.