The Raincoats, released in 1979 (see 1979 in music

1979 in music

See also:Record labels established in 1979* 1979 in music This is a list of notable events in music that took place in the year 1979.-January–February:*January 1...

), was the debut album by The Raincoats

The Raincoats

The Raincoats are a British post-punk band. Ana da Silva and Gina Birch formed the group in 1977 while they were students at Hornsey College of Art, London, England.-Career:...

. The album is perhaps best known for its off-kilter cover

Cover version

In popular music, a cover version or cover song, or simply cover, is a new performance or recording of a contemporary or previously recorded, commercially released song or popular song...

 of "Lola

Lola (song)

"Lola" is a song written by Ray Davies and performed by The Kinks which details a romantic encounter between a young man and a transvestite he meets in a club in Soho, London....

" by The Kinks

The Kinks

The Kinks were an English rock band formed in Muswell Hill, North London, by brothers Ray and Dave Davies in 1964. Categorised in the United States as a British Invasion band, The Kinks are recognised as one of the most important and influential rock acts of the era. Their music was influenced by a...

 and the album's seventh track "The Void", which was covered by Hole

Hole (band)

Hole is an American alternative rock band that originally formed in Los Angeles in 1989. The band is fronted by vocalist/songwriter and rhythm guitarist Courtney Love, who co-founded Hole with former songwriter/lead guitarist Eric Erlandson...

 in 1994. The album was re-released by Rough Trade

Rough Trade Records

Rough Trade Records is an independent record label based in London. It was formed in 1978 by Geoff Travis who had opened a record store off Ladbroke Grove...

 in 1994, with liner notes by Kurt Cobain

Kurt Cobain

Kurt Donald Cobain was an American singer-songwriter, musician and artist, best known as the lead singer and guitarist of the grunge band Nirvana...

. The cover painting is by Pang Hsiao-Li.
The album was re-released on 9 November 2009 in vinyl with a free MP3 download and an extra track "Fairytale in the Supermarket" and as a special edition enhanced digipak CD including live footage from 1977 and 1979 and a video of "Fairytale in the Supermarket" on We ThRee, the band's own label in the UK and on the Kill Rock Stars

Kill Rock Stars

Kill Rock Stars is an independent record label founded in 1991 by Slim Moon and based in both Olympia, Washington and Portland, Oregon. The label has released a variety of work in different genres, making it difficult to pigeonhole as having any one artistic mission...

 label in the USA.

In May 2010 the band performed the album in its entirety in London.

Track listing

All songs written by The Raincoats

The Raincoats

The Raincoats are a British post-punk band. Ana da Silva and Gina Birch formed the group in 1977 while they were students at Hornsey College of Art, London, England.-Career:...

, except where noted:

Side A

1. "No Side to Fall In" – 1:47
2. "Adventures Close to Home" – 1:54
3. "Off Duty Trip" – 3:14
4. "Black and White" – 2:29
5. "Lola
   Lola (song)
   "Lola" is a song written by Ray Davies and performed by The Kinks which details a romantic encounter between a young man and a transvestite he meets in a club in Soho, London....
   
   " (Ray Davies
   Ray Davies
   Ray Davies, CBE is an English rock musician. He is best known as lead singer and songwriter for the Kinks, which he led with his younger brother, Dave...
   
   ) – 4:03

Side B

1. "The Void" – 3:51
2. "Life on the Line" – 4:22 (Lyrics by Ross Crighton and The Raincoats)
3. "You're a Million" – 3:53
4. "In Love" – 3:05
5. "No Looking" – 3:05 (Lyrics translated and adapted by The Raincoats from a poem by Jacques Prévert
   Jacques Prévert
   Jacques Prévert was a French poet and screenwriter. His poems became and remain very popular in the French-speaking world, particularly in schools. Some of the movies he wrote are extremely well regarded, with Les Enfants du Paradis considered one of the greatest films of all time.-Life and...
   
   )

"Fairytale in the Supermarket", The Raincoats first single, is included on all reissues of the album as an opening track since 1993.

Personnel

• Ana da Silva
  Ana da Silva
  Ana da Silva is a founding member of The Raincoats. In approximately 1984 she provided backing vocals on The Go-Betweens' "Bachelor Kisses". In February 2005, she released a solo album The Lighthouse on Chicks on Speed Records. Stuart Moxham of the Young Marble Giants collaborated on one of the...
  
   - vocals, keyboards, guitar
• Gina Birch
  Gina Birch
  Gina Birch is an English musician and film-maker, probably best known as a founding member of The Raincoats.Born in Nottingham where she attended Nottingham High School for Girls, Birch formed The Hangovers and released an album, Slow Dirty Tears, in 1998. In 2002 and 2007 she performed live at...
  
   - vocals, bass
• Palmolive
  Palmolive (musician)
  Palmolive was the stage name for Spanish-born drummer Paloma McLardy, née Paloma Romero. Palmolive was a songwriter and the original drummer for influential punk groups The Slits and The Raincoats....
  
   - drums
• Vicky Aspinall
  Vicky Aspinall
  Vicky Aspinall was the violinist in the English post punk band The Raincoats from 1978 to 1984, and a founder in 1992 of Fresh Records, a UK independent record label with 18 UK Top 40 hits and 23 Club chart #1s to date....
  
   - vocals, guitar, bass, violin
• Lora Logic
  Lora Logic
  Lora Logic is a British saxophonist and singer. She was briefly a member of the band X Ray Spex, although she had been sacked from that group by the time they recorded their first album, which nevertheless used her saxophone arrangements. A year later she formed Essential Logic...
  
  - saxophone on "Black and White"