One From The Vaults - A Godawful Small Affair: Twenty-Six "Blackstar"

The following was originally published on 17 January 2016, a few days after the death of David Bowie.  I am surprised by how much of the album review I stand by, but for context I have provided an additional sentence on my continued relationship with Bowie's music.  Don't expect (little) wonders, darlings; turns out I'm still feeling the loss a little too hard to take this any further.

"BLACKSTAR" (2016)

THE COVER: I wish I could present this without further comment, but for the sake of continuity it's worth noting that the vinyl version is actually black on black.  It's so black, it's like, "how much more black could this be?"  The answer is none.  None more black.



A confession: I did not expect to be writing this.  I assumed "The Next Day" was a retirement album, one last jolly before liberating obscurity.  Then unexpectedly - and perhaps now in context, suspiciously - a new, extremely confusing ten minute single was released.

We now know that the new, less conventionally-structured songs on this album owe much to Bowie's decision to work with musicians who were more familiar with jazz than pop, meaning that the natural constraints of rock music are lifted, and the listener is offered a more challenging yet equally rewarding experience.

I didn't listen to "Blackstar" the song more than once before the album came out, figuring I didn't have to; buying the album was my default position, what I had heard was at least enough to convince me it was more interesting than, say, "Tonight", so there really wasn't much point.

What I can say about it is that I thought it was essentially throwaway pretension on the first listen and got that quite wrong; it's a grower that has at least three genuinely great moments in, moments earned by the journey that gets you there and that justify the sheer length of the piece, which remains an anomaly in rock or pop music.  I also find it helps to think of it as three separate movements; indeed its closest touchpoint in the oeuvre is probably "Sweet Thing"/"Candidate"/"Sweet Thing (Reprise)" from "Diamond Dogs".

So track one's in the bag.  What else have we got?  Well, "'Tis a Pity She Was A Whore" is my particular favourite - but then it would be; whilst much of the album takes obvious cues from Bowie's unfairly maligned nineties output (the unrestrained saxophony of "Black Tie White Noise", the pummelling intensity of "1. Outside", the joyous, scrambling beats of "Earthling"), this is a track you could easily drop onto any of those albums.

"Lazarus", now lent new context (we're getting to that), "Dollar Days" and closer "I Can't Give Everything Away" are the more classically Bowie tracks, in so far as he has a classic sound; they ring with the confidence of "Heathen" and "Reality", but shorn of the more traditional cladding of those albums they fly with the abandon of the new, sounding as vital as any of his material has.

The one slight here - the "TVC15" of the album, if you will - is "Girl Loves Me", which is partially sung in a combination of invented languages.  It has been criticised in some areas of the press for containing swearing, about which I really couldn't care less; I just think it's a slightly less interesting and more repetitive trudge through the musical themes of the album.  Much like "TVC15" though, I bet Bowie was well pleased with it.

All in all the album was far more exciting and forward-looking than you would expect of any 69-year old's artistic output, and left us all wondering was next, and what, if anything, was there left to achieve?  That's the funny thing about life, though: as long as you're still alive, there's always one thing left to do.




And so this time we really do come to a rather final halt; no new albums will there be, no rumoured demoes will I countenance, no further entries for Extra Credit, no peachy prayers, no return for the Thin White Duke.

Which means I should probably try and have a stab at putting my personal admiration for David Bowie into a few inadequate words.  Where do I start with this one?

Firstly I would say that I haven't ever seen so many people that I care about be so perturbed by the passing of a stranger.  I think the reaction to Michael Jackson's death was probably fired by more people, as he was the larger international star, but in terms of people that I specifically share relationships with this was a real hammerblow.

Obviously people react to this in different ways; I and my contemporaries Tim and Ben are blogging.  Another friend put on a tribute night that amped up the attendees to the point the police were called.  Many have taken to social media to express a dislike of cancer.  Whilst I may feel the latter sentiment can go assumed and unexpressed, it's a valid way of assimilating the news, and yet more proof of its wide reach.

Secondly I would say that part of the reason his death has such resonance, and particularly in close proximity to releasing an album this eclectic and future focused, is that there is a genuine fear that there won't ever be another artist like David Bowie; someone who is left largely to his own devices by the recording industry to the extent that he is able to repeatedly inspire consecutive generations of people by adjusting his focus, rather than being encouraged to stick to a familiar formula that can be marketed in a set way.

Frankly, I personally think that this is the case, due to the changes in the industry since the sixties; the immediate post-Beatles landscape legitimised experimental and chameleonic acts, but the return of the rock dinosaurs post-Live Aid, the culture of big band reformation and how it has almost split the industry into two parts, not to mention the Internet, which has freed artists to be heard but also freed them from any hope of making any bloody money out of it, limits the possibility of this happening again.

But then again, I'm getting old.  I wouldn't know the new Bowie if I saw it, as I'd be too busy deriding it for not being the old one.

Finally, it's made me realise how inextricably Bowie's music has been woven into my life, and how many of my significant memories are tied in to it, including of course seeing him in person at Phoenix 1996 (full-on Outside era noise with some classics thrown in for good effect) and Glastonbury 2000 (all-out greatest hits, with a particular focus on "Station To Station" for no apparent reason).

Then there's the first dance at my wedding ("Let's Dance", obviously); the time I performed "Starman" in Karaoke Bar Champion on the outskirts of Golden Gai in Shinjuku, Tokyo; the many Bowie covers of popular beat combo The Eighteenth/Desperate Living, including but not limited to "Jump They Say" and "Heroes"; singing harmonies on "Space Oddity" with my mother shortly before leaving home; or any of a hundred heated debates at Orme Watch HQ.

..And since then, he said, in a single piece of additional, original writing: listening to "Aladdin Sane" three times in a row with my new girlfriend due to drunkenness and distractions, giddy with the first flushes of a big, big love; re-listening to the Glastonbury 2000 set earlier this year and remembering how the between-song banter shaped the vocabularies of two of my most enduring friendships; and simply frugging out and cutting a fine rug at Mirror Moves' Battle of a Billion Bowies...  His music is still dropping in now and then to define moments of my life and make new memories, which might be the best tribute I can possibly pay.

Essentially in closing, I apologise for my hypocrisy.  For years I have said that we shouldn't be sad when an ageing celebrity who's had what appears to be an excellent life dies.  However: now I am sad.  But good lord, what a legacy to celebrate, and I'm glad I got a chance to do it in some small way.

(NEVER REALLY) THE END

"Look out the window... Yeah!"

1. BRAIN DONOR "She Saw Me Coming" (2001)
From the album "Love, Peace And Fuck"

And so the number one spot goes to the only group to feature twice on this countdown, with a track from the very same album.  This truly was the year I rediscovered Brain Donor…

Like “Odin’s Gift To His Mother”, this is presented at an ungodly volume.  Unlike it, this is snappy and no-nonsense, performed at pace, replete with enough lyrics to comfortably fill it and, crucially, has a rock ‘n’ roll swagger that makes it less testosterone-flavoured than its aforementioned album-mate.  It’s an earworm in the “Wrath Of Khan” sense: an absolute head-wrecker, that is tight and demented and makes me wish I was a bouncier person in general, and could summon the energy for a living-room-wrecking bout of limb-flailing and shouting “YEAH!!!” and “WHOOO!!!”.

But that’s not very me, really.  So perhaps best not, eh?

Is it my favourite song ever?  No.  It’s bloody good though, a worthy annual winner, a safe pair of hands for the crown.  But it got me thinking: what IS my favourite song ever?  The answer is “96 Tears” by ? And The Mysterians, with an honourable mention for “Search And Destroy” by Iggy And The Stooges.  But I’ve been in off-cycles for those songs; you can’t overdo it, or the magic is gone.  I can see me retiring “She Saw Me Coming” in a month or two, so as not to empty that particular bottle of its precious lightning.

So if this isn’t my favourite song ever, then can I pinpoint why it’s my most listened-to song of the year?  Well I think it has become, essentially, my entrance theme – the unofficial nation anthem of me.

It’s my go-to song any time I can’t seem to get out of bed, or I’m genuinely scared to leave my flat, or I’ve got an hour to do three hours’ worth of work, or I need to do another five minutes of cardio to be able to look at myself in the mirror without shame, or M. Bison just will not go down at the end of a hard-fought World Warrior tournament.  It helps me tap into the parts of me that work the best, and the parts that everyone likes, and be able to be that version of me for just a little bit when I don’t feel like I can.

It’s not a cure-all, but it certainly makes things seems more achievable; and that’s about the best compliment I can pay any song.  It has been a dizzying 2018, and this song has been its overriding soundtrack, cutting through the funk, confusion and uncertainty and keeping me livid, electric and alive all the way.

And that’s that!  In closing I’d like to say “listen to Retrospecticus.”  And a Merry Christmas to all of you at home!

“It’s the only way you’ll ever know…”

2. PHILIP BAILEY AND PHIL COLLINS “Easy Lover” (1984)

From the album “Chinese Wall”

No, really.

Welcome to THE EIGHTIES.  Thatcherism!  Sinclair Computers!  “Bridge To Your Heart”!  Generation 1 Transformers!  The SDP-Liberal Alliance!  Peter Beardsley!  Sizzlin’ Bacon Monster Munch!  That deferential little Tory royalist snotrag, Ben Elton!  Managed declines!  Keke Rosberg! Phil Cool!  The golden years of “Neighbours”!  An American president who did say ‘well’ a lot!  The constant threat of mutually assured nuclear destruction!  Quatro!

And, of course, Phil Collins by the absolute brimming-full bucketload, be it as part of a now more socially responsible Genesis, his solo offerings and Motown coverings (that would somehow go on to be a massive influence on nineties American hip-hop, because reasons?) and this, a collaboration with a second Phil, albeit one dignified enough to go full Philip but not snooty enough to adopt a second ‘L’.

Philip Bailey: who he?  He was one of the two lead singers for Earth, Wind And Fire, dabbling in solo projects during a hiatus for the band.  Phil Collins produced the album “Chinese Wall”, from which this is taken, and was also linked to EWF by the Phenix Horns (don’t blame me, that’s apparently how they spell it), EWF’s brass section, who not only played on Collins’ solo output but also some early eighties Genesis songs – although it looks like Collins wound up suing them, so I doubt they’ll be working together again.

The single was a transatlantic hit, standing at number 1 in the UK singles chart for four weeks, and hitting number 2 on the Billboard Hot 100, only thwarted by a fellow leviathan in Foreigner’s “I Want To Know What Love Is”.  And why wouldn’t it be?  Without wishing to Patrick Bateman this, it is the Eighties in a single song: all sizzle and no steak, poorly-aged synth sounds and historically weak production, with a sharp-suited, annoyingly self-referential video about making the video…

So why is it good?  Why do I like it so much?  It’s unlikely to be childhood memories, as this would have been radio only – no rogue copies in the home, the only Phil Collins available was pre-“Invisible Touch” Genesis.  It doesn’t seem to have been on the soundtrack to “Grand Theft Auto: Vice City” (though it’s only now I notice that “Pale Shelter” was – another missed opportunity).  And there is no one overriding memory I attribute to this.  It’s just…  Good.  I just like it.

As such, I do feel like I’ve spend more time than is reasonable in my 38 years attempting to defend this song, and always without a great deal of success.  It just does not stand up to any kind of intellectual dissection, being as it is a monolithic reminder of a period when music largely lost any semblance of soul in a slick of synths and production techniques that really, really didn’t like bass.  Yet stick it on, and it’s a tricky one to stay mad at; toes start tapping, air drumming commences, attempts at harmonies lead to tune butchery, and a good time is had by all.

Before I go, special mention must be made of a unique listening situation from earlier this year: in a rowboat, on a river in Bath, surviving numerous water-gun assaults, in celebration of a stag do.  If that’s not classic “Easy Lover” territory, I don’t know what is.

Reader, gird your loins for the final entry, where you’ll join us in our “White Van” for the latest “Messages” as we “Get Off Your Pretty Face”!...  Hang on a minute…

“Whatever cools you down, take a look around…”

3. GIRLS AGAINST BOYS “[I] Don’t Got A Place” (1994)
From the album “Cruise Yourself”

We’ve touched (and gone) on this before, but Touch & Go Records had what I remember to be an almighty roster of Premier League noiseniks, though having just read a partial list of them this seems to extend as far as all the bands I mentioned last time, plus The Rollins Band, Butthole Surfers and a load of other ones I haven’t heard of.  That’s the old rose-tinted classified ad in the back of the Melody Maker for you.  But on the plus side, they did give me free stuff…

For yes!  As mentioned some six entries ago, this song came to me on a 7” from Touch & Go records, sent to me free when I ordered another batch of Jesus Lizard singles, in a physical version of Amazon’s now-classic “People Who Liked This Also Bought…” scary spy function.  And despite not having Putinesque access to my buying habits for the last twenty years, they were perfectly correct in their assumption that I’d like another crushingly loud band with an unusual approach to playing and a non-standard lead vocal.

The whole package is quite something.  The production of Girls Against Boys records is something I’ve always described as “head in a box”; you feel hemmed in by the music, surrounded, like it’s coming from eerily close to your ears as opposed to speakers on the other side of the room.  It’s even more claustrophobic on headphones…  Hm, maybe not ‘claustrophobic’ – I’ll reserve that for the Manics’ paranoid classic “The Holy Bible”.  I think the word I’m looking for is ‘personal’; like it’s happening only for you, and nothing else is happening outside of it.

As a lapsed bass player, it’s really good to hear a band with a two-bass, one-guitar line up as well – it’s always refreshing, and never less than extremely heavy (see also Enemymine).  As a result, there is nothing crisp about this song; everything is fuzzy, jittery and scratchy, like a case of bugs beneath the skin.  Meanwhile, a gentleman who must smoke 80 Marlboro Red a day is drawling the kind of half-awake vocal J Mascis would be proud of over the top of this juddering cacophony.  It was arresting from the second I put it on the turntable, and it still jolts me into livid attention every time it starts up.

It’s been starting up rather a lot lately, given it was the very first track that I looked up upon joining the still-unnamed streaming service, as despite my income-powered buying up of seemingly every CD I had to pass on as a teenager, the album of origin for this track, “Cruise Yourself”, had stayed tantalisingly out of my reach.  I haven’t looked back since.  And in closing: isn’t it nice, in these increasingly cynical times, that a song that was gifted to me as a freebie could have such an impression?

Here comes 2!  And “I’ve Had Enough”!  So let’s show some “Devotion” and take a trip to a “Boogie Wonderland”…

“I am the Nina, the Pinta, the Santa Maria…”

4. RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE "Sleep Now In The Fire" (1999)
From the album "The Battle Of Los Angeles"

What’s ol’ painty-can Zack De La Rocha doing here, eh?  Can’t be anything to do with a high-pace exercise playlist I put together when I joined the gym…

This song is from after I’d forgotten RATM existed, which happened about halfway through “Evil Empire”, when it became clear that the excellent first three tracks (seriously, how good is “Vietnow”?  Go and have a listen.  Go on, I’ll still be here.

…

…

…How good was that, eh?  And thanks for coming back) were not quite illustrative of the mediocrity of the rest of the album.  I still hear songs they did after that album and think they’ve done a comeback single – and more fool me, as there’s some great material from that era which I’m still catching up with, this track being a case in point.

Unfortunately, much like Rasputin, it was a shame how they carried on.  Bereft of De La Rocha, who they lost on a trip to Homebase to pick up some cornflower gloss for his bathroom skirting boards, RATM’s musicians formed Audioslave with the now sadly missed Chris Cornell from Soundgarden, who had a heck of a set of pipes and was a good guitarist in his own right.  The partnership yielded one extremely good lead single in “Cochise”, one OK follow-up in “Show Me How To Live”, and the rest…  Anyway, moving on!

Worse was to come, as the rebels reunited and went utterly mainstream.  But in their defence, they were only taking advantage of an unlikely avenue for re-ignition: getting the UK Christmas number one spot.  At that stage, whoever won reality television show “The X Factor”, which conveniently wrapped up the week before Christmas, got Christmas number 1 – they were in the biggest shop window available in the late 00’s, a prime-time Saturday night terrestrial television show.

In 2008 some dissent had emerged around the incumbent’s use of the song “Hallelujah”, and campaigns were launched to get different, more credible versions to number one – and they failed.  But the next year, RATM’s F-bomb-ridden classic “Killing In The Name” was picked as the protest song of choice, and with the band’s blessing (and their constant promotion of it once the originally grassroots campaign looked like being a winner), it stormed the charts and squatted atop the Xmas hit parade.

This, to me, is not just a cash-grab masquerading as revolution, but also a total besmirching of the grand tradition of the UK Christmas number one.  As holders of this once-honourable office, it is your duty to turn up on Christmas Top Of The Pops in a Christmas ganzie – not one of these archly ‘cool’ efforts with “GARLIC BREAD?” or X-Wing fighters or stuff from bloody “Breaking Bad” on, but a proper one, in red, white and green with reindeer and holly and that kind of shit all over it – ideally in a rocking chair, and croon your hit with a knowing smile whilst fake snow falls around you. 

Instead they turned in a turgid pre-taped live performance, which naturally cut off before the unbroadcastable bit of that song, as we all wondered what the point was, and certain online groups completely missed the point and started planning what obscure classic they were going to get to number one next year.  But since the band themselves won’t do it, then I’ll embrace the festive spirit of forgiveness, and put aside those differences to remember when RATM had a shred of credibility, by giving this cracking tune a quick airing.

Next time, remember to drop by the “Cash Machine” on “Park Avenue”, as we’re off to “Kill The Sexplayer”!

“Fate, up against your will…”

5. ECHO AND THE BUNNYMEN “The Killing Moon” (1984)
From the album “Ocean Rain”

I fucking hate “Donnie Darko”.  I’ve always been suspicious of films that you “simply must” see, especially those with convoluted plots; what usuallyy unfolds on viewing is a poorly-told tale that relies on pretty but dim actors, the kind of faddy visual effects that make the film look fifty years old after five years, plotting that constantly points at you and shouts “aaaaaah!  Weren’t expecting THAT twist, were you?”, and/or a great soundtrack of largely unrelated vintage bangers, designed to fool the viewing public into thinking the film was as good as the songs (delete as applicable).

However, even I will concede that there is one sequence in that film that is very impressive, and I remember being tipped off about it at the time by a housemate who had his ear to the ground on cult films and had given it a whirl in the cinema.  It’s the opening sequence of the film, and it’s set to this stunning piece of music*.  (At least, it was; it’s been replaced in the director’s cut by INXS’ “Never Tear Us Apart”, and shoved unceremoniously into another part of the film.  Apparently not even the director thought his film was good…)

I’ve also, at some stage, decided that I don’t like the Bunnymen in general (I’ve no beef with Echo, he was only following his programming).  Image-wise they seem far too in thrall to ol’ painty-can Lou Reed and The Velvet Underground, the one side of the Holy Trinity that I absolutely cannot stand, and I suspect some of their more arrogant comments may not be solely be for effect.  But this, here: this here is great.  Just sublime stuff – dramatic, ominous, with tons of little touches peppered throughout for careful listeners, yet at no stage is it obvious, overblown or patronising; it’s an infinitely rewarding listen.

And that’s the thing, that’s the mark of true quality: I can’t get down with its creators, and I despise the film this was most memorably used in, yet this and “Bring On The Dancing Horses” (itself at 37 in my annual countdown) are immense songs of undeniable quality.  They make me feel feelings, and I truly believe that they shall echo through the ages as long as human ears remain to listen – yet I’m not exactly clamouring to listen to “Songs To Learn And Sing”.

In other words, this is exactly the kind of song that I listen to more for having access to an unnamed streaming service, with the ability to find practically anything ever done and stick it in a playlist.  It’s almost like changing musical history to a certain extent – accepting the parts you like and discarding those you don’t, and in a more surgically precise way than previously possible.  Is that cheating?  Almost certainly; but each of us will judge the extent we want to do that for ourselves, as listening habits swing away from physical formats and the previously all-encompassing concept of ‘the album’.  It’s not how I ever pictured listening to music.  But it certainly has the odd silver lining.

* = I have deliberately not looked up whether or not this is correct, in terms of whether I have the right scene or not – this is my recollection of one viewing of the film ten years ago, and a conversation with a housemate approximately 15 years ago.  If wrong, happy to be called wrong.

Next up: what is this, the “Year Of The Boomerang?”  You can’t “Take The Power Back” if you don’t “Know Your Enemy”…

“Way down below, and up above…”

6. THE JON SPENCER BLUES EXPLOSION “2 Kindsa Love” (1996)
From the album “Now I Got Worry” 

YEEEEE-AY-EH!!!  C’MON!!!  BLUES EXPLOSION, BABY!!!  I SAID I GOT THE BLUES!!!  I NEED HELP!!!  THE BLUES IS NUMBER ONE!!!  I SAID: THE BLUES IS NUMBER ONE!!!  ADAM COLE, BAY-BAY!!!  I SAID I GOT THE BLUE - THE BLUE MONSTER!!!  SIZZLIN’ BACON, MAN!!!  EVERYONE SAYS ‘HI’!!!...

(cough, splutter)

Good lord, it’s difficult to operate at that level of intensity for more than a few seconds at a time!  Kudos, then, to the almighty Blues Explosion, who were able to manage it for 90 to 120 minutes every night of repeated world tours, playing to bigger houses than their cult-ish record sales would suggest due largely to one simple factor: they are fantastic live.

When former Pussy Galore rabble-rouser Spencer recruited similarly chaos-oriented allies in apparent bluegrass guitarist Judah Bauer and drummer Russell Simins, who uses a kit so small it is insulting to measure it in pieces, some kind of voodoo magic was invoked, and the resultant ultra-power trio set out to immolate stages the world over, with their reputation spreading through word of mouth, when that was a thing: “you HAVE to see this band”.

The first time I saw them properly live at their own show, rather than a festival slot, was…  Well I’m fairly sure it was November 27, 1998, at the Shepherd’s Bush Empire.  Fairly sure, anyway – it fits the timeframe.  The opening of that show was them playing this song, followed by “Flavor” and “Attack”, without stopping.  It never occurred to me that live music could be presented like that, and whilst it could well have been meticulously planned, it seemed incredibly loose and free-flowing – indeed, nigh-on dangerous, to the meticulous setlist-writer and sweaty between-song-drinker that I was as a nascent performer.

The song itself is nestled away halfway through side one of “Now I Got Worry”, a less accessible but arguably deeper picture of the band than presented on their previous album “Orange”.  Both this song and “Orange”’s highlight “Bellbottoms” have a feeling of the brakes cutting out as you careen down a hill, so there’s certainly some consistency there.  In a very Blues Exploison choice, it actually gets quieter during the chorus – though that is in comparison to the verse, which is so loud it sounds like the guitars are screaming in agony.  There’s a really odd but cool overdrive effect on this tune as well; very crunchy, very nice.

Again this was a gateway band for me, and with a little help from my friend Laurie, I was soon all over garage rock past and present – they sent me backwards to The Stooges and The MC5, introduced me directly to Andre Williams, The Countdowns and Brassy, and branched me off into Guitar Wolf, Rocket From The Crypt, The mAKE-UP – God DAMN it, how good were The mAKE-UP? - and The Gories, and their descendants The Dirtbombs and Demolition Dollrods…  To name but a few, or I’d be here all day.  Given all that they have ushered me towards, I will always be more than happy to step up to the stand and wail in their honour.

In our next, probably less shouty instalment, it’s time to “Bring On The Dancing Horses”, as “The Cutter” beckons – but beware, for “Nothing Lasts Forever”!  (Also: some Electrafixion songs.)

“How ‘bout the power… To move you?”

7. TENACIOUS D "Wonderboy" (2002)
From the album “Tenacious D”

Oh dear; here’s another band I was unfairly humourless about back in the day.  Bit of a theme in this part of the chart, it would seem; perhaps I’m making up for lost time!

So back in That Day, they had these things called print magazines – “gimme two ‘zines for a bee”, you’d say to the manager of your local general store – and one of the ones I read was called ‘Bizarre’.  It started as a combination of lurid shock-and-gore and well-researched pieces on cult media, and eventually wound up as softcore porn and gawping at alternative lifestyles – but during the a transitional period where it was doing all four, seemingly up to four thousand pages a month and in danger of breaking most newsagents’ top shelves, I spotted a little boxout about a band called Tenacious D.

It explained that said band featured one Jack Black, and I immediately smelled a rubbish vanity project.  Black is an actor who I took against somewhat unfairly based on reputation and trailers alone; at that stage I’m not sure I’d seen any of his films in totality, yet I carried such enmity towards him you’d have thought he’d kicked my cat.  Since then I’ve definitely softened my stance towards his acting, and feel a little bit unfair for my previous position – an emerging theme in this little series.

Oddly enough, the very next day, BBC Radio One’s Evening Session (or, if cancelled, whatever had replaced it by mid-2002) played their song “Tribute”, and my housemates at the time loved it.  Their debut album became an unofficial soundtrack for the house, along with such luminaries as The Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Queens of The Stone Age and (ahem) Sugababes.  And this led me to reassess my somewhat blinkered original opinion.

You see, this is a comedy band, and comedy is naturally hit and miss; certainly some of the sketches that pad out that debut album can test one’s patience.  But where it excels, oddly enough, in its reference for the source material: classic rock.  The track “Tribute” itself, whilst definitely wearing its humour on its sleeve, shows superior musicianship (helped along by one D. Grohl) and a good understanding of how such a song should be structured.  So it’s a big ol’ muso thumbs up from me, there.

But this track, for me, is the stand out of the album.  Epic, slightly melancholy, extremely silly; it’s got the lot.  It must take a heart of stone not to feel a rush of sheer joy when they describe the titular superhero as having “the power to kill a yak…  From two hundred yards away…  WITH MIND BULLETS!!!”  And it takes me back to Python Express, and that unforgettable fifteen months of the first flush of adulthood – epic, slightly melancholy, extremely silly.

Next time: get out your “Bellbottoms” and dig that “Ditch”, as we check in with a “Blues X Man”!

“And now we meet in an abandoned studio…”

8.  THE PRESIDENTS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA “Video Killed The Radio Star” (1998)
From the soundtrack to “The Wedding Singer”

See, here’s where I take a bit of an issue with the streaming service in question’s analytics (nope, they’ve still not paid me).  I recall listening to this version, like, five times at the most, and The Buggles’ twenty-seven thousand times in late spring/early summer; although come to think of it, I’m not sure I was on the paid version of the service by then, so maybe it wasn’t counting back then.  Alright, I’ll let them off this time.

Anyway, everyone gets a bit sniffy about PUSA (no, I’m not typing it every time), including teenage me back when “Lump” and “Peaches” were out.  How dare these American clowns crash my deadly serious Britpop party with their obvious fun-having and catchy punk-pop tunes?  Why, they didn’t even have enough strings on their guitars, the cads!  And I also remember this song being the final straw; as if the disrespect of their mere existence wasn’t bad enough, they have to drag a classic of early electronic pop through the dirt?  For shame, Presidents!  I will take my leave of you!

Bearing in mind the fact that an American high-energy two-guitar three-piece would soon become my favourite band (but will we be hearing from The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion – for it is they?  You’ll have to keep tuning in to find out, you cheeky sod!), hindsight has shown me to be a great big bloody hypocrite when it comes to these lads, as they’re actually good fun, great writers of snappy tunes and more musically accomplished than their setup would suggest.  So let me use this seldom-read blog to offer an official apology to the band – I was young and naïve, and I can assure you I now know better.

But this, of course, isn’t one of theirs, and wasn’t originally anywhere near their down-the-line punk stylings – though it is a fabulous adaptation, and more reverentially treated than their somewhat odd cover of the MC5 classic, “Kick Out The Jams”.  It was used on the soundtrack of the decent comedy flick “The Wedding Singer”, which must have got them a few bob, as that was a pretty big film at the time, and was also released as a single with the movie’s branding on the packaging.

The Buggles’ version, on the other hand, is massively electronic in backing, with an odd, heavily accented and clipped vocal delivery that sounds like it’s coming live from days gone by, helping immensely with the message and the atmosphere.  It is heavily associated with the start of MTV, and not just lyrically: it was the first video ever shown on the channel.  ‘Ey, remember when MTV showed music videos?  Eh?  Eh?  You’d ‘ave to use yer brass ‘and to tune t’telly in!

I think people tend to remember that video and underestimate the emotional punch of the song, which is at its heart a tale of obsolescence, of the inevitability of the world moving on and of things changing to the extent where, in the words on the songs, “you are the radio star”.  And, therefore: dead – killed by video, or whatever ‘it’ is when what you’re with is no longer ‘it’ and what ‘it’ is seems weird and scary.

It won’t just happen to you – it’ll happen to all of us, which to me makes this a universally poignant song, and an oddly appropriate one to be listening to on my Bluetooth headphones, and via this new-fangled streaming technology, shorn of any ties to an album or back catalogue.  It’s not how I expected to be listening to music at all, and as a lapsed musician, it’s not how I intended my own music to be enjoyed.  Which suggests that in this case, *I* am the radio star – and in turn explains why this gets me right in the feelings, every single time.

(With apologies to Athletico Mince for the obvious nick.)

Next up we pay “Tribute” to some masters of rock, so pack your “Kielbasa” and hit “The Road”!

“No cat would ever do that…”

9. THE JESUS LIZARD “Countless Backs of Sad Losers” (1994)
From the album “Down”

David Yow is inhuman.  Usually “he sounds like he’s gargled with rocks” is used as a compliment in music; in this case, it sounds like Yow has done that and come away with permanent injuries and post-traumatic stress.  It is a singular, strangled growl, simultaneously throat-scrapingly arid and disgustingly wet, and it is without a doubt my favourite voice in rock music.

My favourite thing about The Jesus Lizard in general is that their sound is so unique, you can tell one of their songs from verse one, second one.  If it doesn’t kick off with Yow’s irate gurgling, it’ll be Mac McNeilly’s pounding drums beating a grim, unstoppable tattoo, or David Wm. Sims with the bass sound I aspire to above all others, both top-heavy and rumbling below with a hint of overdrive, or Duane Denison, a guitarist who can only be described as shit hot, with his signature trebly wail owing as much to sirens and airborne combat as to conventional electric guitar.  To the uninterested ear, it’s just noise.  When you get it, though, you fucking get it.

I first got it when the band that at that time I loved above all others, the mighty Nirvana, did a split single with The Jesus Lizard, released by the legendary US underground record label and distribution company Touch & Go Records, of whom more shall be spoken down the line.  Nirvana’s entry, “Oh The Guilt”, was a window back to their punkier “Bleach” days after the surprising sheen of “Nevermind” – a slow hand clap there for Mr Butch Vig, who is America’s greatest Shakespeare lookalike, the very image of England’s greatest playwright, the spit of The Bard.  He could rake it in as a model for credit card holograms if Garbage ever splits up; he really, really looks like Shakespeare.

And The Jesus Lizard sent forth “Puss”, from their album “Liar”, and it was utterly without compare in my admittedly short experience in music.  Nothing that insanely loud yet oddly calm, that disparate yet united, that chaotic yet ordered, and all behind that uncanny voice – how was he getting away with it?  How do you even take care of a voice like that?  Arsenic throat pastilles?  Somewhere in my tiny mind, a voice that would not be stifled said, ‘I must know more’.

Touch & Go had a great mail order business, even in the UK.  In those days, you could find mail order record store adverts at the back of your weekly print copy of Melody Maker.  You’d ring them up and give them your parents’ credit card details, or cut out the little order form and mail it off with a cheque or postal order; then you’d tie an onion to your belt, which was the style of the times; and in six to twelve weeks you’d either get what you wanted, something else or nothing at all, for some, all, or more than all of the money you intended to spend.  Great days!  I hasten to add that I had no such problems with T&G though, and even received some little bonuses – of one of which, more will be spoken later.

I explored every inch of their back catalogue, ordered all the 7-inches and cassette tapes my allowance would allow, and immersed myself in the wonderfully macabre world of The Jesus Lizard - and later, Yow and Sims’ previous band Scratch Acid, producer Steve Albini’s bands Big Black, Rapeman and Shellac, Yow’s collaboration with Qui, Touch & Go labelmates Girls Against Boys and influences such as Chrome; clearly they were a gateway drug to other noise rock and grindcore.

And yet I never seemed to get to see them live – everything from miscommunication and lack of money right up to a death in the family stymied me, through to the eventual dissolution of the band, after an unlikely spell on a major label and McNeilly’s departure (luckily he was replaced by the equally-capable James Kimball).  When they reformed and played a single London date, I broke that duck.  Despite their obvious ambivalence – the official tour t-shirt was a picture of some bags of money – they played many classics with their usual zest that night, and as the final, savage notes of “7 vs. 8” blasted into the venue, I delighted in my great fortune to finally see these titans of cult hard rock do what they do best.

They didn’t play this one, though.

Bastards.

Next time out, get ready to “Kick Out The Jams”!...  In a “Dune Buggy”?  Strap in, as it could be a “Lump”-y ride!

“DURR DURR DURR DURRRRRR DURRRRRR! DUH-DUH-DUH-DUH-DUH DURRRR, DUR; DUH-DUH-DUH DURRR, DUH DURRRR DURRRR!”

10. CFO$ "The Rising Sun" (2016)

Settle in, chums; it’s wrestling time.  Let me tell you about the time when, for just one glorious night in January 2018, World Wrestling Entertainment did something it hadn’t done for a very long time before that: it got absolutely everything right. 

Shinsuke Nakamura is probably the best wrestler in the world.  He’s not a superheroic, steroid-sculpted muscle monster like Hulk Hogan or Ultimate Warrior, he’s not a hard-working, savvy underdog like Bret Hart or Daniel Bryan, and he’s not an anti-establishment icon like Steve Austin or Shawn Michaels.  He’s a gangly, uncanny, disconcerting Japanese man, with a character based as much on Michael Jackson as Rikidozan, a background in mixed martial arts and a fearsome reputation.  His finishing move is a running knee to the face.  At times it legitimately looks like he’s killed his opponents.

I was lucky enough to see him wrestle in Tokyo, albeit as part of a short multi-man match on the undercard of Best of Super Juniors, but even from his scant minutes in that match, dismantling the unfortunate Captain New Japan, it was clear he had something you couldn’t teach.  He was an absolutely immense presence.  Luckily for me, his excellent match with AJ Styles had brought him to the attention of the former WWF – still the biggest wrestling company in the world.

They signed him up; he had a succession of fantastic matches against the likes of Sami Zayn and Samoa Joe, came up to the main roster, greatly impressed pretty much every single WWE fan, ran roughshod over top names like Randy Orton and John Cena to make his way into the world title picture, and then…  Nothing.  Losses in key matches, poor to no scripting, large swathes of time off television – but the memory of his match with Styles, and the knowledge that the latter was WWE’s current world champion, kept the fires burning in fans’ hearts.

At January 2018’s Royal Rumble event, headlined by the first ever women’s version of the annual 30-person single elimination battle royal, Nakamura entered at number 14 in the men’s match, as every fan in attendance, and everyone in the pub to which my girlfriend and I had decamped to stay up until 5am and watch the event live, sang along to his WWE entrance music, “The Rising Sun”, which was a hell of a feat in itself given it’s an instrumental.  It’s a great track as well, with an oriental flavour but a western rock sensibility – and even its existence shows WWE have come a very long way, given all their Japanese wrestlers used to be given the same borderline racist plinky-plonky music.

But he wasn’t going to win, surely?  Not with WWE’s chosen one, Roman Reigns, in there.  Not with Orton and his myriad of second chances, with iron man Finn Balor still in there, with a returning Rey Mysterio in his path.  And again, Nakamura would have to go through Cena – a man not noted for losing.  When Cena was eliminated and the final two of Reigns and Nakamura faced off, the pub was at fever pitch, and I clutched my girlfriend’s hand so tight I lost the feeling in my fingers.  When Reigns hit the floor, it all went off – hugs, high fives, screaming: it’s the most fun I’ve ever had watching wrestling.  And then an interviewer asked who was next for Shinsuke, and he spake thus… “A.  J.  STYLES!!!”  It truly seemed like WWE could do no wrong.

Then he went to Wrestlemania and lost and we all went back to complaining again.  And now, we approach another Royal Rumble, with WWE again in a seemingly can’t-lose situation.  But will they drop the ball again?  I’ll tell you this much: If Lynch Loses, We Riot.

Next time, let’s get a “Post-Coital Glow” and take a dip in “My Own Urine”, because “Mary Had A Little Drug Problem”!  (Hang on – that last one’s Scratch Acid.  Damn.)

“When all you do is see me through…”

11. TEARS FOR FEARS “Pale Shelter” (1983)
From the album “The Hurting”

Primal therapy advocates who foolishly didn’t use the name Primal Scream for their band, avoiders of Live Aid and each other, and sowers of the seeds of love, Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith, had massive success in the United States at a time when that simply didn’t happen.  Even more impressively, success happened for them almost immediately, with their third single “Mad World” shooting to number three in the UK singles chart.  Some eighteen years later, this perfectly good song would be utterly destroyed with a cloying, mawkish, glacial cover by Michael Andrews and Gary Jules, as featured in the shit film “Donnie Darko”.  I’m not sure if you can tell, but I’m still a little bit sore about that one.

Now, back to the matter at hand.  “Pale Shelter” was originally their second single back in ‘82, but the version I always listen to is the re-recorded version from their debut album “The Hurting”.  It’s been in my life for a fair old while; I remember quite plainly my parents having this album on vinyl in a house we lived in around 1984, but must also admit that I don’t recall hearing it at the time.  Part of me thinks we might not have had a record player upon which to play it, but I get very mixed up about that time, as I was in low single figures of age.

Clearly that’s a long, long time ago, so why do I remember it?  Well, partly for the stark music; cold and distant, busy enough to feel accomplished, yet minimalist enough to retain its personality, even dare I say its charm.  It’s the highlight of “The Hurting”, for me a nose ahead of the more automatic title track, the poppier “Change” and the well and truly spoiled “Mad World”, despite a self-indulgent lyric railing at the protagonist’s parents.  But aside from this, a very good friend of mine picked up a copy back in the late nineties and we got to enjoy it all over again as drunk teenagers.

What happened next?  Well, somewhat unfair criticism of the album’s production and musicianship seems to have driven them to search for a more polished, professional and epic sound, leading them to disappear up their arses with “The Seeds Of Love”, which cost a million pounds to make in 1989, introduced the world to Oleta Adams, and was led by a Beatles-aspirant (near) title track that seemed to stay in the charts for 40,000 years, but is rarely replayed these days.  Meanwhile, “Pale Shelter” is some sad git’s eleventh most played track of the year.  I think I know which era of Tears For Fears won THAT one.

For a final chuckle, try to imagine if Tears For Fears were called Primal Scream, and Primal Scream were called Tears For Fears.  It’s about the only way Bobby Gillespie could look more ridiculous.

(Thank you to Kristian for giving me a creative jump-start halfway through this one.)

ARE YOU READY for next time?  Then “Break It Down”, or risk getting “Snakebit”, because “Here Comes The Money”!

“You know I feel so…”

12. BRAIN DONOR "Odin's Gift To His Mother" (2001)
From the album "Love, Peace And Fuck"

Introduced to me by a clued-up friend during one of my serious Stooges phases, this act – a three-piece of Julian Cope and two members of Spiritualized, playing some seriously loud, metal-tinged garage rock – were very well received by that me, and were one of the first acts I looked up on the streaming service that shall remain unnamed (unless they want to pay me) – in spite of their pretentiousness.

Pretentiousness?  From Julian Cope?  Surely some mistake.  But yes, even in this stripped-down power trio, designed to play some hairy rock ‘n’ roll with no faffing around, there’s this oddity: a thirteen-minute prog sprawl in four movements (“Theme From ‘Speed Kills’”, “Shamanic 4 A.M.”, “Consecrate The Fucker” and “Huntsabbers’ Ball”, fact fans!) is absolutely ridiculous.

Quite simply put, this is the least feminine piece of music I’ve ever heard.  It starts with an interminably repeated opening riff, hairy of chest and Brut-scented, played at a volume that makes a mockery of the human digestive system, eventually adding a keyboard that, bafflingly, sounds like a choir of Clangers.  On, through the detached, I’m-so-cool-I-don’t-even-need-a-proper-lyric “you know I feel” bit, which frustratingly fails to resolve itself over and over. 

Forward to the twiddly-widdly part that sounds like your stoned mate with his new delay pedal, and reminds me of that quote from Wilko Johnson about the ‘Lord Of The Rings’ being for girls, and on to a stompy, sweary ending that might as well be a “Raw Power”-era Stooges outtake.  It strides on without a care for the listener – you’re either with it or against it, and it couldn’t care less.

This is without glamour, without reason, without sense, without compromise – a huge great slab of a technically faultless but structurally challenging song, and one that actively dares you to stop listening, whilst tempting you with what might happen next.  It is punk doing prog, and it is wrong on so, so many levels.  It is an affront to nature.  It simply should not be.  And yet… 

And yet.  It’s my twelfth most played song of the year, so it’s no surprise that I must like it.  Specifically, I really like that opening riff, dead-horse-beating and all – it has a hypnotic effect, it’s hard as nails and it’s good struttin’ music for when struttin’ time inevitably comes around.  Do I often make it the full running time?  I’d have to say no (which, interestingly, clearly doesn’t effect the count of the number of times I’ve listened to it – seriously, I’ve finished this song maybe twice all year).  But when I do, I’m always glad to have to made the journey.

It's a “Mad World” next time, so let’s “Break It Down Again” before we have to go “Sowing The Seeds Of Love”!  Because NOBODY wants that last one.  NOBODY.

“’Til the fearless come, and the act is done…”

13. KILLING JOKE "Love Like Blood” (1985)
From the album “Night Time”

Of all the songs in this line-up, this is the one where I genuinely can’t work how it got here.  I like it – I like it plenty, I like it just fine.  But do I like it thirteenth-most-played-song-of-year amounts?  The stark answer is: no.  Still, the stats don’t lie, and I can get some laughs out of an ageing rocker who calls himself “Youth”, so let’s get on with it!

Bands had a great workrate back in those days; this is taken from Killing Joke’s fifth album in six years, recorded some time after they decamped to Iceland to avoid the coming apocalypse.  (Bands were also berserk back in those days.)  It seems to be one of their bigger hots, perhaps their biggest, and has been described as their mainstream breakthrough, which suggests a gradual softening of their original sound.

(Also, I’ve just found out Youth doesn’t even play on this one.  Oh well, that’s most of my material out of the window.)

And, er…  That’s basically all I know.  There were some Killing Joke albums knocking around my house when I was young, but those were “Brighter Than A Thousand Suns” and “Outside The Gate”, so I’m not quite sure where I picked up an ear for this particular track.  It’s a corker though, balancing an ominous air with a rising pop chorus and a driving bassline from the dear departed Paul Raven.  Again, though: 13^th most listened to?  If you say so.

The most memorable time I heard this was at a Planet X reunion night at what used to be called Bumper on Hardman Street, Liverpool, last year – literally the last thing that venue put on, as it closed the next day…  I want to say it was called Legion of Lost Souls?  Something like that?  (This lapse in memory would be acceptable if it was a story from the nineties, but no; this was 2017, and I still can’t remember it.  A good bet some beers had been had, then.)

On that night a friend of mine was on the wheels of steel, or whatever material CD players are made of, and I was sitting at the edge of the dancefloor as he did his thang, which included a spirited airing of “Love Like Blood”.  As soon as it started – before it had even really kicked in – a middle-aged couple squealed with delight and raced onto the dancefloor, the only time they’d be seen there all night.  I’m going to guess it was ‘their song’, and that it was a very important moment for them, as they looked delighted and in love as they bopped along to this most unlikely of serenades.

I believe this is where the children would use the following hashtag: #lifegoals.

Join us next time in our “White Van” for the latest “Messages” as we “Get Off Your Pretty Face”!

“Maybe you weren’t on my side all along…”

14.  DINOSAUR JR “Out There” (1993)
From the album “Where You Been”

…Or, more relevantly for me, from the soundtrack to “Wayne’s World 2”, as owned by me on tape in the early-to-mid nineties.  I (mis?) remember there being a printing error on the inlay, which led me to believe this was the first track on side two, when in actual fact – shock horror! – it was the last track on side one.  Boy, I hope someone got fired for THAT blunder.

I remember said soundtrack being slightly under par, particularly in comparison to the first “Wayne’s World” soundtrack; then again, it might just be that I’d had more experience of music by then and found it perhaps less surprising, plus that it coincided with my swing away from largely American rock to British indie music, as a quick review of the respective tracklistings show the sequel to be the superior offering.

With more of a focus on classic rock, including Golden Earring’s road ode “Radar Love”, the Joan Jett version of “I Love Rock ‘N’ Roll” and Edgar Winter’s sublime instrumental workout “Frankenstein”, and a version of The Carpenters’ melancholic masterpiece “Superstar” that not even the hateful Chrissie Hynde can drag down, it simply hangs together better as a coherent whole.

That’s not to say it doesn’t have its problems – nobody needed “What’s Up?”, let alone a second 4 Non Blondes song, and the two Aerosmith live offerings are execrable, and I say that as an Aerosmith apologist.  I draw the line at apologising for “Dude Looks Like A Lady” though – it wasn’t cool to say that then, it isn’t cool to say it now, and it needs throwing into a flaming bin, right next to “Ace Ventura: Pet Detective”.

When I got that tape, I didn’t know that much about Dinosaur Jr, other than having their track “Start Choppin’” – from the same album as this, as it turned out – on a compilation called “Loaded”, which I’ve written about elsewhere.  This is the heavier of those two, but very similar in layout – hooky, solo-laden grunge guitar mini-epics with a slack drawl crooned over the top.  When I say ‘solo-laden’, I’m not lying; the song STARTS with a guitar solo, and there are at least two other solos throughout.  It’s like ZZ Top in flannel shirts with cracked amplifiers, and it’s really, really good.

It blew me away the first time I heard it (well, technically; I must have heard it in the film, but I certainly didn’t recall that when listening to the soundtrack), it blows me away today.  It completely blew me away at Nightmare Before Christmas 2006 in Minehead’s Butlins, when a quaint English holiday camp was invaded by Iggy and The Stooges and about 12,000 grunge, punk and stoner bands.  And when I hear this I’m always transported back there – full of beer, fat of gut, ill-advised of fashion choices, watching a profoundly grey haired J Mascis tear into that opening solo.

Join us next time for a band who were known in the “Eighties”, but still active around the “Millennium”, and are best heard from “Outside The Gate”!

“The century is drawing to its close…”

15. MCALMONT AND BUTLER "What's The Excuse This Time?" (1995)
From the compilation "The Sound Of McAlmont And Butler"

Let's kick off our Christmas festivities with a tale of holiday depression, set to the toe-tapping sounds of David McAlmont wondering why he isn’t getting laid.  As “You Do”.  (A little McAlmont And Butler joke for you there.  You’re welcome.)

I’d owned “The Sound Of McAlmont And Butler” since I found a copy in Bedford’s cavernous branch of Cash Converters the day after having a conversation about their debut single “Yes”, which is easily their best-remembered song.  Having paid peanuts for the CD, I went home and listened to “Yes” – and turned it off, due to a naïve disinterest in what else was on the disc.  This pattern would repeat every nine months or so for somewhere in the region of eleven years…  Until Christmas 2013.

What was different about that time?  Well, I’d just returned from a friend’s wedding in New York full of the joys of spring and hungry to get my teeth into work and build up the ol’ savings again.  So it was a bit of a blow when I almost immediately had to interview for my own job, and was unsuccessful – but was made to continue in the job the company said I wasn’t good enough to do until my replacement was appointed.

Something about that smash-cut from good times to bad times broke my brain a little bit, so that Christmas saw bitter times, accompanied by can after can after can of Fosters, the official lager of not being arsed anymore, and marathon Doom 2 sessions.  It was during one of these demon-slaying pity parties that I put “The Sound Of McAlmont And Butler” on, and subsequently couldn’t summon the enthusiasm to walk to the CD player and change it after “Yes”.  This, then, is track two on that disc – and reader, I enjoyed it.  And possibly due to drunkenness, I mused on the infinite surprises that life can throw up, and resolved to pull myself out of my funk and get things sorted.

Then, like, three days later, Michael Schumacher had his skiing accident.  Life, eh?  What a shitter.

Anyway, you’ll probably want to know what the song’s like.  Well, it’s pretty good – otherwise I wouldn’t still be listening to it in 2018, regardless of context and association.  A nice little piano riff kicks us off, as McAlmont needles an allegedly lazy lover with every trick in the book, such as doubting their prowess, citing previous agreements and mentioning just how long it’s been.

He then moves on to speculating as to whether he’ll get any before the end of the century, which at that stage was bearing down on us all like a speeding juggernaut of hope and chaos, but to paraphrase the words of another popular song of the time, was nothing special.  Frankly it just sounds like they have very different sex drives, so they’re probably better off splitting up and pursuing people more their own speed, but that’s the benefit of distance I guess.

Apparently Bernard Butler’s also on this, but you’d be hard pressed to identify his contributions, other than a bit of guitar that goes “biddly bee” near one of the choruses.  He wasn’t long out of Suede at this point, but still a while away from Creation Records’ cringe-worthy attempt to make a solo star out of him, when he would clearly rather have been playing guitar for someone else and looking after his cats.  And when the results are this good, who can blame him on either count?

Join us tomorrow for number 14.  The band in question formed part of a “Freak Scene” in the nineties, so “Start Choppin’” or you’ll “Feel The Pain”!

My Festive Fifteen

This has been my first year using a music streaming service (I’m not telling you which one as I’m not getting paid for this).  I’ve enjoyed the convenience of it and the range of tracks available, albeit with a few unfortunate oversights – whither the “Too Sussed EP”?  And where’s “Luxury Plane Crash”? – so overall it’s been a worthwhile experience.

A week or so ago, said service sent me an email with some analysis of my listening habits in.  It was fascinating, and even more so when combined with the “Top 100” playlist I was also provided with.  It also made sense – for instance, my five most listened to acts of the year were David Bowie, Half Man Half Biscuit, Suede, REM, Manic Street Preachers.  Suede had a new album out, Bowie and REM both released live albums of concerts I was at, I got a great Manics playlist from a friend, and I spent five hours on a single day listening to HMHB and desperately trying to shut out the world while I did some analysis.  So far so good.

But the Top 100 itself…  Now that is an interesting artefact.  As a DJ friend of mine found out a few years ago, these kinds of service mean you can listen to whatever you want, from whenever you want.  So whilst it’s probably no surprise, given my age, that there’s only one track from this year in the top 100 (the lead track from the new Suede album), I did find that at least the top twenty weren’t all there on merit alone; indeed, many of them had soundtracked significant moments in my life, and the freedom of access to nearly all of history’s music had drawn me back to them.  Others had led me to internal debates and conclusions that, in turn, evidenced for me why I had been listening to this collection of songs more often than anything else.

On top of that, my aforementioned top five most listened to bands had reasonably weak showings in the top 100 - with their top entries coming in at 47 (“Ashes To Ashes”), 33 (“Took Problem Chimp To The Ideal Home Show”), 75 (“Life Is Golden”), 43 (“What’s The Frequency Kenneth?”) and 51 (“Faster”) respectively - so the tracks at the sharp end were largely one-offs from acts that I didn’t listen to full albums from.

It was at this stage that I thought about writing a “Festive Fifty”, based on the first half of the list, as a wayward tribute to both John Peel and this set of songs that was my 2018.

Then I decided not to, as I’m a lazy, lazy man.

Then I wavered a bit.

Then I thought, “sod it, I’ll do the top twenty – no-one’s reading the Final Fantasy stuff anyway.” 

Then I realised that a Festive Fifteen had better alliteration and was less work.

Then I got annoyed because number sixteen was “Breaking The Law” by Judas Priest, and I’d loved to have written about that.  But it was too late by then, I was on my way.

(Also I’ve started it way, way too late so you’re getting two a day, which in retrospect I should pretend was a deliberate artistic affectation.)

And now: we’re here.  If you take this journey with me, you’ll laugh, you’ll cry, and you’ll learn what a sad git I am.  So if “You Do” want to read on, say “Yes” and do “The Right Thing”, which is to check back here…  Er, whenever the next one goes up.  (Probably quite soon.)

Everybody Up! - Epilogue

OH YES WE CAN LOVE - A History Of Glam Rock

Purchasable here: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Oh-Yes-We-Can-Love/dp/B00EJU8ZZ4

And here's the top pop picks from each disk!

DISK 1:

THE STOOGES "1969"

Honourable mentions: BILLY FURY "Jealousy", CURVED AIR "Back Street Luv", VINCE TAYLOR AND HIS PLAYBOYS "Brand New Cadillac"

DISK 2:

T. REX "Metal Guru"

Honourable mentions: MICK RONSON "Growing Up And I'm Fine", THE OSMONDS "Crazy Horses", ROXY MUSIC "Virginia Plain"

DISK 3:

SPARKS "This Town Ain't Big Enough For Both Of Us"

Honourable mentions: KISS "Rock And Roll All Nite", SAILOR "A Glass Of Champagne", FOX "Only You Can"

DISK 4:

Argh...  This is too difficult...  Fuck it.  TWO WAY TIE!!!

THE RUNAWAYS "Cherry Bomb"

BONEY M. "Rasputin"

Honourable mentions: MAGAZINE "The Light Pours Out Of Me", ADAM AND THE ANTS "Antmusic", BLONDIE "Rip Her To Shreds"

DISK 5:

Sorry to be predictable, but it has to be EARL BRUTUS "The SAS And The Glam That Goes With It" (here performed by their latest incarnation, THE PRE NEW)

Honourable mentions: MARILYN MANSON "The Dope Show", SUEDE "Metal Mickey", MORRISSEY "Glamorous Glue"




THE END




(See you all back here next week for "Each Holding An ORB" - it's only twelve years late!)

Everybody Up! 21 - Unstoppable (Except At The End)

14. THE DARKNESS "Growing On Me"

Fad retro metal here from the flavours of the half a week from 2003, featuring the constantly inappropriately-dressed frontman Justin Hawkins, who would eventually produce an imagination-free cover of "This Town Ain't Big Enough For Both Of Us" under the guise of British Whale, with a video featuring darts supremo Phil "The Power" Taylor.

(DON'T look it up.  It's not worth it.)

I did not fall under the spell of these particular flashes in the pan at the time, when they were suddenly selling out arenas and contending for Christmas number one before completely disappearing, though many of my contemporaries did, so I have had plenty of exposure to their works.

I must say that this isn't nearly as bad as I remember - "I Believe In A Thing Called Love" was always the more annoying of their main two singles, and this one is relatively inoffensive hair metal, with the jarringly high voice of their lead singer deployed as a special weapon rather than all over the bloody place - so you could say, it's grown on me!!! (cymbal crash, mild jeering)  Ooh, tough crowd...

15. GOLDFRAPP "Strict Machine"

Another act who had a brief flirtation with mainstream success, Goldfrapp draw a shocking lineage from our friends Fox, who back in the day (and on one of the earlier disks) built a reputation on a coquettish frontwoman and off-kilter pop stylings - in this case, strictly electronic in flavour, like Moloko taken to its logical end.

As it's all very "ooh, I might have sex with you and it might be a bit pervy", I really don't have a great deal else to say about this, so let me pull the curtain back a crack on this business we call show: sound engineers rate diva-ish antics by artists they process on the Alison Goldfrapp Scale, and let's just say no-one else tops that out.

16. THE ARK "Clamour For Glamour"

Here come some Swedes.  Seasoned swedes, at that, with a career spanning nineteen years between 1991 and 2010.  And pretty popular ones as well - in Sweden at least, with three of their five albums going to number one.  A stark contrast to their career in the UK, which was crowned by a single reaching 121; turns out we're not the centre of the universe after all!

You would be forgiven for thinking, after the run we've been on, that this track was largely included due to the word "Glamour" in the title.  But no: I'm pleased to report that they are thematically correct, being both glam AND rockers, and this is a pretty good offering.

I did promise myself I wouldn't just parrot facts out of the book that came with the compilation - for one thing, it gives you less incentive to buy it, and I do actually recommend you do so - but it would be remiss of me not to mention that they toured with The Darkness at one point since, well, we've just mentioned The Darkness.  So, y'know...  There's that.

17. FOXY SHAZAM "Unstoppable"

Oh my sweet lord Schumacher, we've actually made it to the final track of the final disk of the compilation, some approximately seventeen years after starting to write about it!  It's not pat on the back time yet, though; to be frank I usually drift off a bit on this disk after Marilyn Manson, so let's have a quick listen to this one and see if it evokes any distant memories...

(twenty minutes later)

...No.  It hasn't left an impression.  OK, so as an essentially new offering, what do we have here?  Well it's definitely glam in a good many ways, including the stomping beat, marching bass and inspirational riff, coupled with the Freddie Mercury-esque vocal (they really should have shelled out for Queen.  A bit of "Seven Seas Of Rhye" would have gone down a storm at the end of the last disk).  They're also American, despite sounding very English - it's usually the other way round, so that's quite heartening to hear for once!

It's obviously not the most heavily played or well remembered song on this collection - which is a by-product of ending a glam retrospective in the 2000s, I guess - but it's a perfectly cromulent offering, and one which I was glad to re-listen to tonight as I finally wave a fond farewell to the compilation.  It's been a journey not without its rough patches, but one that was very much worth taking.

Perhaps you'd like to follow in my footsteps?

Everybody Up! 20 - Hair Design By Nicky Clarke

10. EARL BRUTUS "The S.A.S. And The Glam That Goes With It"

Long time favourites of this writer, Earl Brutus were arguably the most underrated band of the nineties - although I could probably give you a list of ten to twenty "most underrated bands of the nineties", depending on time, mood and level of inebriation.

Completely out of step with the mainstream perception of "indie" music at the time, with neither a sharp image nor sickening youth on their side, and a penchant for nodding to both punk and classic rock at a time when both were considered extraordinarily passé, their crunching wall of guitars, samples and popular culture sloganeering struck a chord with this oddbod at the very least.

This is probably their best known offering.  Named after an inscription on a VHS video spine, this is the perfect summation of what Earl Brutus did, and their continuing legacy band The Pre New still do: a simple but catchy guitar hook; an excellent shout-along chorus ("you are your own reaction", in this case); and a bit in the middle where it all breaks down and goes a bit sketchy, before crashing perfectly back into step to career down the hill to the end.

Perfect.

11. GAY DAD "To Earth With Love"

And now for something completely different: Cliff Jones, music journalist, like many of his kind (and, let's face it, your esteemed writer - I will not be a hypocrite about this) actually wanted to be a rock star.  So he tried and he tried and he eventually came up with this - an absolute photofit of the kind of thing that was getting indie bands signed at the end of 1997 by a music industry desperately, gluttonously eating itself up in search of a quick buck.

And signed did he get, to the eventually ill-fated London Records, and out did it come, getting to number 10 in the charts.  And lo, did they go on to do nothing of consequence, being arguably the biggest case of Emperor's New Clothes since good old Sigue Sigue Sputnik.  See?  I can do continuity.  Who said I couldn't?  (smashes bottle) WHO SAID I COULDN'T???

Ahem.

The exact opposite of Earl Brutus, then - had all the right moves for the time but no individuality and consequently no lasting legacy.  No surprise mentions on major terrestrial television, no love from The Quietus, no enduring iconography - nothing but this two bit writer resentfully banging out a tattoo of mediocrity upon his barely mid-range laptop.  And when my rancid tapping comes to an end, well: what remains then?...

12. MARILYN MANSON "The Dope Show"

An interesting personal case of full circle, here: some time ago, a friend of mine (hello, Christian!  Though you're not reading this!) opined that the Marilyn Manson album "Mechanical Animals" was the closest we would get to a glam rock album in this day and age.  He was right on the money as well - the drum patterns, the gender play, even some of the riffs fully support that assessment.

And here we are with a vindication of that position - the inclusion of that album's lead single.  A perfect example of how to piss off middle America, the song actually starts with a shout of the word "DRUGS!" and progresses as idiot-baitingly as you would expect.

But as is the norm with mid-period Marilyn Manson, there is actually a great tune buried under the controversy - and a glam rock tune at that, albeit one spiked with ketamine to achieve a funereal crawl, fighting for its own breath under the weight of its own diseased guitars.  Which a very funny way of saying I really like the song, but there you go.

13. PULP "We Are The Boys"

Oh fuck off Jarvis.

Some time ago, a friend of mine (hello, Dan!  Though you're not reading this!) opined that we would look back upon the music of the nineties with great affection, aside from one band.  That band, dear reader, was Blur.  Time has proved him wrong, for it is Pulp.

What appeared at the time to be innovative storytelling pop - and to be fair, hindsight hasn't dulled that - now grates, with the knowledge that every one-fingered keyboard intro will bring a tale of Jarvis Cocker's favourite hero, one Mr Jarvis Branson Cocker, and how incredibly great he is, and how every girl that's turned him down in the past is a sad, fat slag who made the wrong decision in not shagging him, despite the fact that he looks a creepy, lanky hobo scarecrow on dope.

It's a shame how grating this has become for me, as I was a big fan back in That Day - and "Intro" and "His 'N' Hers" are still pretty good, it's just the post-fame albums that are quite this formulaic - but I just can't do Pulp anymore. 

Oh, and just so I've actually said something about the song, it's from the "Velvet Goldmine" soundtrack, where Bowie's obvious reluctance to be involved in speculation about his sex life led to Britpop bands being tapped up to do glam-style songs.  That went exactly as well as you'd imagine.

Join us next time for the end.  Really truly, honestly, the end.  We're not pulling A Godawful Small Affair-job and chucking in another entry in the wrong order - if we did, not even a picture of a weasel could redeem us.  So join us next time for the omega.