Misplaced Pages

Fried
Studio album by Julian Cope
Released	19 November 1984
Genre	Neo-psychedelia psychedelic pop
Length	40:31
Label	Mercury
Producer	Steve Lovell
Julian Cope chronology
World Shut Your Mouth (1984) Fried (1984) Saint Julian (1987)

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic
Encyclopedia of Popular Music
The Great Rock Discography	7/10
MusicHound	2.5/5
Q
Record Mirror
The Rolling Stone Album Guide
Select	4/5

Fried is the second solo album by Julian Cope.

Background

Fried was released on 9 November 1984, just six months after Cope's first solo album World Shut Your Mouth. Cope retained the guitarist Steve Lovell and the guest oboe player Kate St. John from the previous album, but added his Drayton Bassett musical foil Donald Ross Skinner on rhythm and slide guitars, the former Waterboys drummer Chris Whitten and, on one track, the former Mighty Wah! guitarist, Steve "Brother Johnno" Johnson.

The album was much more raw in approach than its predecessor. In many respects, it prefigured the looser and more mystical style which Cope would follow and be praised for in the following decade. Notoriously, the sleeve showed a naked Cope crouched on top of the Alvecote Mound slag heap clad only in a large turtle shell. Song topics and approaches included early examples of Cope's subsequent tendency to mythologise his own life and connect it to legend and ritual ("Reynard the Fox" combined English folk tales with reference to Cope's notorious onstage stomach-slashing incident the previous year; "Bill Drummond Said" was an oblique fable about Cope's former manager and the future KLF mainstay) and his developing interest in paganism ("O King of Chaos", which Cope later revealed was an invocation to Odin). Several songs had little or no backing, with Cope accompanying himself.

Despite receiving better reviews than its ill-fated predecessor, Fried sold even more poorly at the time, as did the accompanying single, "Sunspots". The commercial failure of the album led to Polygram dropping Cope. He subsequently found a new manager, the artist and musician-cum-prankster Cally Callomon, and signed a new deal with Island Records. Skinner and Whitten remained with Cope for the next album, Saint Julian.

Bill Drummond's 1986 album, The Man, replied in kind to "Bill Drummond Said", with a song titled "Julian Cope Is Dead".

In 2007, The Guardian included the album in their list of "1000 Albums to Hear Before You Die".

Track listing

All tracks are written by Julian Cope

2015 expanded edition

The first disc of the expanded edition contains the ten tracks from the original album.

Charts

Personnel

• Julian Cope – vocals, bass guitar, rhythm guitar, piano, organ
• Steve Lovell – electric guitar, recorder solo on "Sunspots"
• Donald Ross Skinner – slide and electric guitar
• Chris Whitten – drums
• Steve "Brother Johnno" Johnson – electric guitar solo on "Sunspots"
• Kate St. John – oboe
• David Carter - tuba on "Sunspots"

Technical

• Paul King - production supervisor
• Paul "Chas" Watkins - engineer, recorded by
• P. St. John Nettleton - art direction, design
• Donato Cinicolo - photography

References

1. Agarwal, Manish (2016). "Julian Cope - Peggy Suicide". In Dimery, Robert (ed.). 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die. London: Cassell Illustrated. p. 659.
2. Raggett, Ned. "Fried". AllMusic. Retrieved 6 October 2012.
3. Larkin, Colin (2011). "Cope, Julian". Encyclopedia of Popular Music. Omnibus Press. ISBN 9780857125958 – via Google Books.
4. Strong, Martin C. (2004). "Julian Cope". The Great Rock Discography (7th ed.). Canongate Books. p. 335. ISBN 1-84195-615-5.
5. Graff, Gary; Durchholz, Daniel, eds. (1999). "Julian Cope/The Teardrop Explodes". MusicHound Rock: The Essential Album Guide. Visible Ink Press. p. 271. ISBN 1-57859-061-2.
6. Columnist. "Fried". Q. October 1996. pg. 178, cited 6 October 2012
7. Strike, Andy (17 November 1984). "Julian Cope: Fried". Record Mirror. Vol. 31, no. 47. Retrieved 19 August 2024.
8. Considine, J. D. (1992). "Julian Cope". In DeCurtis, Anthony; Henke, James; George-Warren, Holly (eds.). The Rolling Stone Album Guide (3rd ed.). Random House. pp. 161. ISBN 0-679-73729-4.
9. Harrison, Ian (October 1996). "Julian Cope: World Shut Your Mouth / Fried". Select. No. 76. p. 112. Retrieved 19 August 2024.
10. "Record News". NME. London, England: IPC Media: 37. 3 November 1984.
11. Jon Savage, "Stone me!", The Observer, 10 August 2008
12. Cope, Julian (2000). Head-On/Repossessed. Thorsons Publishers. ISBN 0-7225-3882-0.
13. "Artists beginning with C (part 1)". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 14 March 2023.
14. "Julian Cope - Fried". Official Charts. Retrieved 6 October 2012.

• 1984 albums
• Julian Cope albums
• Mercury Records albums