About this item

Fire Engines’ life as a band might have been over before it had barely begun, but the punk sired Edinburgh band’s short life blazed with incident and colour. ‘Boredom or Fire Engines – You Can’t Have Both’ went the legend. The small and imperfectly formed back catalogue they left in their wake sounded like they had crawled out of a cellar and come blinking into the inner-city light in a parallel universe somewhere between Leith Walk and CBGB’s. Boredom wasn’t an option.

Edinburgh’s incestuous inter-band family tree also included crossovers with The Flowers and Boots for Dancing, both of whom released singles on Bob Last and Hilary Morrison’s Pop: Aural label. Following the release of their debut single – ‘Get Up and Use Me’ / ‘Everything’s Roses’ – on the Codex Communications imprint – Fire Engines too found a home with Last and Morrison’s post Fast Product label.

Now remastered from Bob Last’s original master tapes together with two accompanying John Peel Sessions, ‘Chrome Dawns’ is the definite Fire Engines artefact including the 7” inch – ‘Candyskin’ / ‘Meat Whiplash’ – now regarded as a classic; the mini album – Lubricate Your Living Room – as a wilfully perverse objet d’art; and the 12” – ‘Big Gold Dream’ – best remembered by some for its sleeve. Despite such limited output, Fire Engines had a rich history the brevity of their lifespan doesn’t do justice.

TRACK LISTING

LP Tracklisting
Side 1
1 Get Up And Use Me
2 Everything’s Roses
CODEX COMMUNICATIONS CDX 01, December 1980
3 Plastic Gift
4 Get Up And Use Me
5 Sympathetic Anaesthetic
6 Discord

Side 2
7 New Thing In Cartons
8 Hungry Beat
9 Lubricate Your Living Room Pt. 1
10 Lubricate Your Living Room Pt 2
11 Plastic Gift (Version)
Lubricate Your Living Room POP: AURAL AAC
001, January 1981
12 Candyskin
13 Meat Whiplash
POP: AURAL POP 010, May 1981

Side 3
1 Candyskin
2 (We Don’t Need This) Fascist Groove Thang
3 Untitled
4 Discord
JOHN PEEL SESSION
Recorded February 23rd 1981 / Broadcast
March 9th 1981
5 Sympathetic Anaesthetic
6 New Thing In Cartons

Side 4
7 Big Gold Dream (Unused Intro)
PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED
8 Big Gold Dream
POP: AURAL POP 013, December 1981
9 The Big Wrong Time
10 Qualitamatic
11 Young Tongues Need Taste
12 Produced To Seduce To
JOHN PEEL SESSION
Recorded November 14th 1981 / Broadcast
November 23rd 1981

CD Tracklisting
Disc 1
1 Get Up And Use Me
2 Everything’s Roses
CODEX COMMUNICATIONS CDX 01, December
1980
3 Plastic Gift
4 Get Up And Use Me
5 Sympathetic Anaesthetic
6 Discord
7 New Thing In Cartons
8 Hungry Beat
9 Lubricate Your Living Room Pt. 1
10 Lubricate Your Living Room Pt 2
11 Plastic Gift (Version)
Lubricate Your Living Room POP: AURAL AAC
001, January 1981
12 Candyskin
13 Meat Whiplash
POP: AURAL POP 010, May 1981
14 Candyskin
15 (We Don’t Need This) Fascist Groove
Thang
16 Untitled
17 Discord
JOHN PEEL SESSION
Recorded February 23rd 1981 / Broadcast
March 9th 1981
18 Sympathetic Anaesthetic
19 New Thing In Cartons
20 Big Gold Dream (Unused Intro)
PREVIOUSLY UNRELEASED
21 Big Gold Dream
POP: AURAL POP 013, December 1981
22 The Big Wrong Time
23 Qualitamatic
24 Young Tongues Need Taste
25 Produced To Seduce To
JOHN PEEL SESSION
Recorded November 14th 1981 / Broadcast
November 23rd 1981

Disc 2
1 The Untitled One
2 Insert Yourself
3 Discord
LEITH COMMUNITY CENTRE, March 16th 1980
4 Sympathetic Anaesthetic
5 Get Up And Use Me
6 Hungry Beat
7 Everything’s Roses
8 The Untitled One
WILF SMARTIES LIVE SESSION, August 2nd 1980
9 Get Up And Use Me
10 Discord
11 Hungry Beat
12 Everything’s Roses
13 Get Up And Use Me (Reprise)
WHY DOES THE POPE NOT COME TO
GLASGOW?
EDINBURGH FRINGE, August 18th-September
6th 1980
14 Produce To Seduce To
15 Get Up And Use Me
16 Hungry Beat
17 Plastic Gift
18 Discord
19 New Thing In Cartons
20 Coca Cola Cowboy
21 Meat Whiplash
22 Candyskin
EDINBURGH VALENTINO’S CLUB, August 9th
1981
23 Clip (Excerpt)
CC SOMERVILLE SHOW, January 12th 1981
24 Jacqueline
NEW! 000, December 2004