Open Your Box 12: The Flipside

Back in the days when 7-inch singles were the only means of getting new songs, the extra songs that artists included with the main track were called "b-sides," confined to the flipside of their featured records. The name has stuck, and b-sides now just refer to unreleased tracks and rarities left off albums, ending up on singles, compilations, deluxe editions, etc. Some artists release few b-sides over the course of their career, but some are especially prolific, producing new b-sides for each full single release. Sometimes the b-sides end up rivaling their proper album material, and earn a place in the artist's canon of essential tracks. Here is a selection of some of my favorite b-sides, pulled at random from a large collection (so more can be expected in the future!). Not featured here is Coldplay's "Crests Of Waves" (see the last post), though it definitely belongs with the best b-sides. The Cardigans' "Country Hell" is an instant rocker that should have made it onto First Band On The Moon. The Smashing Pumpkins released an excellent rarities album Pisces Iscariot way back in 1994, featuring unreleased tracks like the great "Frail And Bedazzled." Garbage certainly should have released a b-sides album by now, as excellent throwaways like "Enough Is Never Enough" prove. Björk, never a stranger to musical exploration, pulls out all the stops on her b-sides, taking the introspective sounds of Vespertine to an extreme with the playful "Domestica." Belle & Sebastian's The Life Pursuit album didn't contain its title track, but it easily could have fit in with its upbeat themes of imminent change. Radiohead, like Björk, have enough weirdness on their albums to rival any sonic adventurers, and as a result their b-sides sound like radio waves from foreign planets, as the haunting Amnesiac-era "The Amazing Sounds Of Orgy" displays.

The Cardigans, "Country Hell" [YSI] (from the single Your New Cuckoo and the compilation Best Of)
The Smashing Pumpkins, "Frail And Bedazzled" [YSI] (from the compilation Pisces Iscariot)
Garbage, "Enough Is Never Enough" [YSI] (from the single Cherry Lips (Go Baby Go!))
Björk, "Domestica" [YSI] (from the single Pagan Poetry)
Belle & Sebastian, "The Life Pursuit" [YSI] (from the single The Blues Are Still Blue)
Radiohead, "The Amazing Sounds Of Orgy" [YSI] (from the single Pyramid Song)

***Note: Links removed***

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