Reading, Writing and Arithmetic

Reading, Writing and Arithmetic was the first album from The SUNDAYS.  Recorded in three and a half months, the album was released in the United Kingdom on the Rough Trade label on January 15, 1990 and three months later in North America on Geffen's GDC label.  In November 1989, a few weeks before the release date, Rough Trade provided a brief preview of the album through a freebie flexi single featuring the track I Won via UK music magazine The Catalogue.  But, the album marked nearly a years' period since their debut single, Can't Be Sure, hit the bins in early 1989. A somewhat active tour schedule, including a supporting slot for Throwing Muses' Spring 1989 UK tour, however, continued to fuel and sustain the growing hype surrounding the band.

There was a lot anticipation preceding its release but the album ultimately proved a hit,  selling 60,000 copies in the first two weeks after release, hitting number 4  in the UK national charts. This, in turn, earned them greater and higher profile media attention and an even larger audience. In America, this translated to unprecedented success among 'alternative rock' listeners, selling over 500,000 copies and becoming a top 5 hit.  

Reading, Writing and Arithmetic features 10 tracks co-produced by the band and Ray Shulman.  Shulman was a member of Scottish 70s band Gentle Giant (bassist, one of the three brothers) and later an active record producer during the 80s/90s, working with Ian McCulloch, The Trash Can Sinatras, and The Sugercubes, among others.  Lindsay Jamieson, best known as the drummer for the now-defunct UK indie band Jim Jiminee, is credited for playing tambourine on the album.  Incidentally, Patch's brother, Nick Hannan, was the bassist in Jim Jiminee.

"One Little Indian, another English independent label, passed The SUNDAYS' demo on to Ray Shulman, who'd worked on the Sugarcubes' first album. He liked it and rang up Rough Trade saying he'd like to work with the band.  'We didn't know too much about his work,' say Gavurin. 'It was more that he seemed like a nice bloke and pretty easygoing. We certainly didn't want any heavyweight producer who was going to sort of [say], 'This is how your record should sound.' Shulman realized that simplicity was one of the band's most endearing traits and didn't try to clot up their sound". (Village Voice, Los Angeles 1990)  

Naturally, Reading was one of the more prolific releases for the band on a global basis.  Rough Trade had many different distribution points and so a variety of countries outside of the UK and US issued proper releases.  Many of these issues however can be harder to find in the sense that Rough Trade Records went belly up in 1992 and all copies of the album effectively went out of print for some time in the UK (and in other countries) until the Parlophone/EMI re-release in 1996.  

Although track order and cover sleeves seemed fairly consistent on a global basis, it is worth stating that the Japanese CD release added the rare b-side Don't Tell Your Mother as a bonus track.   Additionally, as most fans probably recall, the lyrics for Reading were not included with the album.  For whatever reason, the band always seemed shy and vague about song lyrics and their underlying meaning ("I don't like to talk about the lyrics..." says Harriet, The Catalogue, 1989).  But, there actually were a handful of official releases that included the album lyrics: the Japanese CD (via an insert), the Italian vinyl LP (on a printed inner sleeve) and the Taiwanese cassette (insert) - all still hard to find releases.  If you were able to track it down, the official songbook was available in the UK and North American markets in 1991, which also contained the lyrics to the album along with the song chords.