Snapshots #307: A Top Ten Songs Named After Boats

All aboard!

Ten songs with boat names in the title...

10. Known for spreading their seed.

Jethro Tull invented the seed drill.

Jethro Tull - The Flying Dutchman

9. Plucked from the Ashes.

That's Charlotte Hatherley, former guitarist in Ash...

Charlotte Hatherley - Dawn Treader

The Dawn Treader is a boat in CS Lewis's Narnia novels. 

8. Hallyday Hears A Who.

Johnny Hallyday + Horton Hears A Who...

Johnny Horton - Sink The Bismarck

7. From the harbour, through the turnstiles, onto the bridge.

Coldspring Harbour, Turnstiles & The Bridge are all albums by...

Billy Joel - The Downeaster Alexa

6. Kisses on the Liffey.

The Pogues are Irish kisses; the Liffey is in Dublin.

The Pogues & The Dubliners - The Irish Rover

I never get tired of watching a young Shane McGowan perform.

5. Churchwarden very angry inside bathroom. 

Inside "Churchwarden very angry" you will find den-ver. The John is the bathroom.

John Denver - Calypso

4. Copacabana, Bathsheba or Omaha, lads? 

They're all beaches, boys.

The Beach Boys - Sloop John B

3. Cornershop.

Bodega - Jack In Titanic

2. I forgot old thong.

Anagram!

Gordon Lightfoot - The Wreck Of The Edmund Fitzgerald 

1. This is the day of the expanding man.

That's the opening line of Deacon Blues by Steely Dan. 

Set sail for more Snapshots next Saturday...

Snapshots #255: A Top Ten Greek Mythology Songs

This is Gal Gadot, the 21st Century Wonder Woman. Yesterday, we had Linda Carter, the 20th Century version. Wonder Woman is a superhero who traces her origins back to Greek Mythology. And here are ten songs that do the same...

10. Pucker up.

Pogue is an Irish kiss. As in Pogue Mahone, which tells you to kiss my... well, you know the rest.

The Pogues - The Wake of the Medusa

9. Meryl, Julianne, Nicole.

Meryl Streep, Julianne Moore and Nicole Kidman starred in the movie The Hours.

The Hours - Icarus

Great song. Great band. Much missed.

8. Halfway through, it stops moving.

Midway Still - Cyclops

Extra points if you got that one.

7. What are real berks worth?

"Real berks worth" is an anagram.

Walker Brothers - Orpheus

6. Canadian city haunted by Russian ghost.

Regina is the capital of the Saskatchewan province.

A ghost is a spectre. In Russian, that might be a Spektor.

Regina Spektor - Oedipus  

5. If the Hulk played violin and cello, this is what he'd call his group.

He'd be incredible with the strings, don't you think?

The Incredible String Band - The Minotaur's Song

4. When Elvis Costello meets Kathy Kirby, they drop their aliases.

Elvis Costello is really Declan McManus. 

Kathy Kirby was really Catherine Ethel O'Rourke.

Put them together and you get...

Declan O'Rourke - Zeus & Apollo

3. Late celebrity.

Midnight Star - Midas Touch

2. Confused mod.

That may be the shortest anagram I've ever featured.

OMD - Pandora's Box

1. Popeye boldly goes to kiss Kelly.

Gene Hackman played Popeye Doyle in The French Connection.

Gene Roddenberry created Star Trek.

Gene Simmons is in Kiss.

And finally, we have Gene Kelly.

Gene - Olympian

It's a Herculean task, but there will be more Snapshots next Saturday...

Mid-Life Crisis Songs #45: Anniversary

It was our anniversary on Tuesday. As we're not married, it was the 15th anniversary of our first date, on which Louise fell up the steps to the cinema, revealed that she doesn't like coffee (my staple diet) and cut the evening short because she was "tired, hungry and stressed". I didn't expect a second date.

Anyway, it was our anniversary, and though we'd both bought each other a card and (small) present, we forgot all about it on the day itself and so we didn't exchange them until the following morning.

When we finally opened the cards, although they were different , they had an identical message on the front.

Who says romance is dead?

Here's two old favourites that seem appropriate... though neither of them really capture anything about our relationship. That song has yet to be written...

Cover Me Monday #6: Guitar Man

I didn't discover that Jerry Reed wrote Guitar Man until recently. Before I became a fan of his back catalogue, I only really knew Reed from his role as Cledus "Snowman" Snow in Smokey & The Bandit (for which he also wrote and sung the theme tune, East Bound & Down). As well as being an actor, Reed was a successful singer and guitarist, but he arguably found the most mainstream success as a songwriter, scoring hits for Elvis and Johnny Cash, among others. Let's face it, once Elvis has had hits with a couple of your tunes. life probably becomes a lot easier.

Here's Jerry's original version of Guitar Man.

And here's Elvis's version, the one most people recognise.

My first exposure to the song was in the early 90s though, when it was included on a charity compilation of Elvis covers released by the NME, called The Last Temptation of Elvis. There are some mighty fine covers on this two disc set, including The Pogues doing Got A Lot O'Livin' To Do, Fuzzbox with Trouble and You're So Square by The Primitives. The set leads off with Bruce's version of Viva Las Vegas, which is OK... but I always preferred the ZZ Top cover.

However, my favourite track on that compilation was the Jesus & Mary Chain doing Guitar Man. An unusual choice for the band in question, since it's such an upbeat song with a real pop tune... unlike most of their own material. They make it typically JAMC though - lots of feedback! - and while I'm not saying it's better than Elvis or Jerry... it's definitely a contender.

The United Kingdom of Song #20: Liverpool

I went to Liverpool yesterday for the first time in my life.

As it's unlikely I'll be going back anytime soon, I thought I'd feature it here today. There are, of course, far too many popular musicians who hail from the city to mention them all here. Suffice it to say that I was slightly disappointed that I didn't see any of them during my brief visit. I'd at least have expected to bump into Sir Thumbs Aloft, gurning at me from the top of the Liver building. Next time, I guess I'll have to go to the Mull of Kintyre.

There are also far too many songs that reference Liverpool in their lyrics to ever name them all here. At least I managed to get in and out of the city without once hearing Ferry Across The Mersey. I decided to restrict myself today to just songs in my collection that feature Liverpool in the title.

Curiously, two of the best ones are by American recording artists who probably only know the city because it's where dem Beatles come from. Dey doo dough, don't dey dough?

Suzanne Vega - In Liverpool

The Bangles - Going Down To Liverpool

The next two Liverpool I found were via Wales and Ireland... both near enough, I guess, but no proper Scousers...

Manic Street Preachers - Liverpool Revisited

The Pogues - The Leaving of Liverpool

All of which leaves me with just two Liverpool songs by actual Liverpool artists... and fortunately, neither of them is by a Beatle. So let's have them both today...





Sad to say that I don't have that Little Jimmy Osmond song in my collection. I know, shame.

My Top Ten World War I Songs

100 years ago today.

Here's ten songs in tribute to all those soldiers - on all sides - who lost their lives in what tragically wasn't "The War To End All Wars".

With a special mention to Franz Ferdinand, who started it all...



10. Whistling Jack Smith - I Was Kaiser Bill's Batman

Rumoured to be based on a WWI marching song, the hit version was written by the two Rogers: British songwriters Cook & Greenaway. There was no Whistling Jack Smith, and some debate over who actually did the whistling. On the album version, someone shouts "Oi!" near the end, but this was "cleaned up" for the single release and changed to "Hey!" instead.

Those crazy 60s also brought us The Royal Guardsman - Snoopy Vs. The Red  about Baron von Richthofen, Germany's infamous Red Baron airman. Charlie Brown's cartoon pooch Snoopy often imagined himself fighting The Red Baron in the war.

9. Metallica - One

One of the more accessible Metallica songs, about a WWI soldier whose injuries are so terrible he's left praying for death.

8. The Zombies - Butchers Tale (Western Front 1914) 

Definitely the scariest song on this list... perhaps because (unlike Metallica's usual fare) it's a million miles away from the sunshiny pop of She's Not There.

And I have seen a friend of mine

Hang on the wire

Like some rag toy

Then in the heat the flies come down

And cover up the boy

And the flies come down in

Gommecourt, Thiepval,

Mametz Wood, and French Verdun

If the preacher he could see those flies

Wouldn't preach for the sound of guns

7. Siouxsie and the Banshees - Poppy Day

...In Flanders fields

The poppies grow

Between the crosses

Row on row

That mark out place

We are the dead...

Based on a 1919 poem by war poet John McCrae. See also 10,000 Maniacs take on Wilfred Owen... Anthem For Doomed Youth.

6. The Beautiful South - Poppy

Leave to Paul Heaton to mourn with bitterness and anger...

They dressed you up and took you off to World War One 

Armed you and surrounded you with wire 

Sat in stinking mud you sung your stupid songs 

And waited till they told you when to fire

Cause the rulers always laugh 

At a video bloodbath 

Nothing makes them laugh 

Like a video bloodbath

From the First World War to the Yom-Kippur 

It was Beadle's About 

The bayonets slice, the rockets roar 

And he jumps out

5. The Pogues - The Band Played Waltzing Matilda

Written by Scots-Aussie Eric Bogle (whose other big WWI tune was The Green Fields of France), but Shane and the boys did the definitive version for me...

When I was a young man I carried my pack

And I lived the free life of a rover

From the Murray's green basin to the dusty outback

I waltzed my Matilda all over

Then in nineteen fifteen my country said, "Son

It's time to stop rambling 'cause there's work to be done"

So they gave me a tin hat and they gave me a gun

And they sent me away to the war

And the band played Waltzing Matilda

As we sailed away from the quay

And amidst all the tears and the shouts and the cheers

We sailed off to Gallipoli

4. Radiohead - Harry Patch (In Memory Of)

Written in tribute to "the last surviving Tommy", the oldest survivor of WWI who died at the age of 111 in 2009...

I am the only one that got through

The others died wherever they fell

It was an ambush

They came up from all sides

Give your leaders each a gun and then let them

Fight it out themselves

3. PJ Harvey - On Battleship Hill

Polly Jean mourns the 500,000 who died at Gallipoli...

On Battleship Hill I hear the wind,

Say "Cruel nature has won again."

2. Randy Newman - Going Home

Here's Randy's explanation of this song...

This is a World War I song.
World War I fascinates me because it was such a shock to the world.
Nothing before or since has come close.
It was a horrible, horrible event.
It was modern weaponry and cavalry and then tanks.
They fought for four years over a hundred yards, some ridiculously small amount of ground.
It's the stupidest event in history.
This is one of those songs that I just can't sing - it's right in one of the cracks in my range.
So we did it to approximate what a recording of that era would sound like.
I know Mitchell's going to get blamed in some review for using all these effects, but we did it because I simply can't sing the thing.

1. The Farm - Altogether Now

I was nineteen when this record came out and I had no idea what it was about. I guess I just didn't listen to the lyrics...

Remember boy that your forefather's died

Lost in millions for a country's pride

But they never mention the trenches of Belgium

When they stopped fighting and they were one

A spirit stronger than war was at work that night

December 1914 cold, clear and bright

Countries' borders were right out of sight

When they joined together and decided not to fight

All together now

All together now

All together now, in no man's land

The same old story again

All those tears shed in vain

Nothing learned and nothing gained

Only hope remains

All together now

All together now

All together now

In no man's land

The boys had their say they said no

Stop the slaughter let's go home, let's go, let's go

(See also Pipes of Peace by Sir Macca Thumbs Aloft... which I like more than I ought to... but then, I was only 11 when it came out.)

My Top Ten Horse Racing Songs

Apparently there was a big horse race last weekend. I wouldn't know. I'm not a fan of horse races. But I do like the odd horse race song. Here's ten runners and riders... who'll be the winner?

(There's no Bob Seger in this countdown. I just like that album cover.)

Special mentions to Grand National and Race Horses.

Oh, and this old song from Racing Cars... which explains why I won't ever go for a day at the races.


10. James -  Sometimes (Lester Piggott)

One of my favourite James songs, though I've no idea why they stuck the famous tax-dodging jockey's name in brackets after the title. Various suggestions I've read online include that the beat of the song sounds like racing hooves (erm... not really) or that this was a phrase the roadie used to call out during soundcheck. We may never know, and any connection to horse racing seems tenuous at best (which is why I've placed it at Number 10)... but it's a cracking tune.

9. Dan Fogelberg - Run for the Roses

Look, if Sting wrote this, I'd be taking the piss out of him for writing a song from the second person perspective of a race horse... but I'll cut Dan Fogelberg a bit more slack because he doesn't have a stripy jumper. Make sure you've got your cheese-board ready for this one...

Born in the valley 
And raised in the trees 
Of western Kentucky
On wobbly knees
With mama beside you 
To help you along 
You'll soon be growing up strong
All the long, lazy mornings 
In pastures of green 
The sun on your withers 
The wind in your mane 
Could never prepare you
For what lies ahead

8. The Pogues - Bottle of Smoke

Let's face it, if you went down the racetrack and found Shane MacGowan there... well, you'd hardly be surprised, would you? You might be surprised if he won though...

Twenty fucking five to one
Me gambling days are done
I bet on a horse called the Bottle of Smoke
And my horse won

7. Bill Monroe and his Blue Grass Boys - Molly And Tenbrooks

The real deal - from 1957, and a bluegrass CD I picked up for 50p in a charity shop.

Tenbrooks was a big bay horse 

He wore that shaggy mane

He run all around Memphis 

He beat the Memphis train

6. Richard Thompson - The Angels Took My Racehorse Away

You see, this is the problem I have with horse racing. What happens to those poor horses?

There's a racecourse in the sky
And that's where all the racing horses must go by and by
And I believe every steward, lord and groom
I believe that they're calling her home

5. Carly Simon - You're So Vain

Well, I hear you went to Saratoga
And your horse, naturally, won

Naturally. Mick, Warren, David... whoever this song was about, he was just a git. Full stop.

4. The Band - Up On Cripple Creek

Good luck had just stung me
To the race track I did go
She bet on one horse to win
And I bet on another to show

Odds were in my favor
I had him five to one
When that nag to win came around the track
Sure enough he had won

Apparently, "Up on Cripple Creek is notable as it is one of the first instances of a Hohner clavinet being played with a wah-wah pedal". Which, I'm sure you'll all agree, is... erm... something.

3. Elbow & Richard Hawley - The Fix

You see, this is why you shouldn't waste your money on gambling - it's all fixed anyway.

The fix is in

There's a nag gonna dance home at Epsom

The fix is in

Can't wait to see how it upsets 'em

(That's one great rhyme there, Guy.)

2. George Jones - The Race Is On

Only George Jones could turn use a racing commentary to chronicle heartbreak...

1. The Hold Steady - Chips Ahoy!

An outsider romps home! But it's one of my favourite Hold Steady tunes. (Great video too.)

She put $900 on the fifth horse in the sixth race
I think its name was "Chips ahoy!"
It came in six lengths ahead,

We spent the whole next week getting high

Chips Ahoy! would be a cool name for a racehorse.



Which is your Shergar?

My Top Ten Kitty Songs

I was jolted awake  at 5.55 on Christmas morning, not by Sam's excitement over Santa having visited, but by Louise saying, "there's someone downstairs playing Christmas music". With my heart pounding, I got out of bed and crept to the top of the stairs from where I could hear the sad refrain of Judy Garland wishing us a merry Christmas.

With visions of (at best) a burglar with a sick sense of humour or (at worst) a blood-drenched psychopath in a Santa costume, I ventured downstairs to discover...

The kitchen radio on at full blast.

Burglar?

Psychopath?

Poltergeist?

Or hyperactive kitten standing on top of the on button?

As I've already done My Top Ten Kitten Songs, here are ten kitties...


10. Sparks - Here Kitty

Ron & Russell's kitten gets stuck up a juniper tree. Bloody thing.

9. Bee Gees - Kitty Can

From 1969, when the Bee Gees were more like The Monkees. You'll have to watch it to see what I mean.

8. Bobby Darin - Pretty Miss Kitty

The airbrushed side of rock 'n' roll. Still fun.

7. The Pogues - Kitty

The Pogues did Trad. Arr. folk tunes better than most.

6. Presidents of the USA - Kitty

The Presidents are well and truly hacked off with their kitten...

Kitty up and scratch me through my jeans
Fuck you, kitty you're gonna spend the night
Fuck you, kitty you're gonna spend the night
Fuck you, kitty you're gonna spend the night
OUTSIDE!

5. Cat Stevens - Kitty

Cat plans on partying with his Kitty.

4. Racey - Kitty

Yes, Racey.

That'll put the kitten among the pigeons.

You may know this better as the Toni Basil version, Hey Mickey! You may also choose to deny knowledge of either. But I know when you're lying...

3. Laura Cantrell - Kitty Wells Dresses

Cred instantly restored (in some quarters, at least) with a lovely bit of pedal steel and one of John Peel's favourite country singers.

2. Darts - The Boy From New York City

Racey and Darts in the same top ten? I can still irk those musos when I want to.

Sing it after me:

Ooh ahh ooh ahh, cool, cool kitty...

1. Bruce Springsteen - Kitty's Back

Those of you who know about such things will hardly be surprised to find this early Bruce number holding off all challengers at Number One. I song I loved so much, I named the novel I wrote for my English degree (my excuse for a dissertation!) after it. My tutor was scathing... but I scraped at 2:1.

This live version from '78 is amazing...


Any kitties in your collection?

My Top Ten Postcode Songs

OK, so I know L7 weren't named after a Liverpool postcode... but my cred is already in tatters, I'm not about to open a post with a picture of East 17.

Anyway, songs named after (British) postcodes. A challenge I just couldn't resist. I couldn't think of any named after American postcodes... or zip codes... though I'm happy for you to suggest them. The closest I came was Kitchen by The Lemonheads, because they were "thrilled to be in the same postcode as you".

Here's ten songs that even Postman Pat should be able to deliver to the right address...



10. Jonny Rubbish - Living In NW3 4JR

"A parody of the Sex Pistols." Which is all very good, but if ever there was a band that were perfectly capable of being a parody of themselves without any help from anyone else, it was the Sex Pistols.

Still, amusing for one or two listens.

9. Madness - NW5

Madness doing wot they do best. Singing abaht Lahndahn staff.

Yes I watched you climb up
I seen you come alive
From those very humble beginnings
In NW5

8. Saint Etienne - B92

No idea why Sarah and the boys think hate and fear is taking over Solihull, but why else would this tune be called B92?

And if it's not a postcode, then I respectfully submit this alternative: The Birdman of EC1.

7. Ian Brown - Longsight M13

Inner city Manchester... although the person who uploaded the song to youtube filled the video with pictures of the South Bank. You can imagine the comments!

Lets the stars shine on
Until the break of dawn
Let the stars shine on
And let her move, move like a queen
Of Longsight M13

I was disappointed to learn that M5 by The Fall is about the motorway, not Salford.

6. Splodgenessabounds - I Fell In Love With A Female Plumber From Harlesden, NW10

He can't wait to see her again. At which point, he will probably buy her Two Pints of Lager & A Packet of Crisps.

5. Ride - OX4

Ride never went too far away from Oxford without getting homesick

4. Ray Davies - Yours Truly, Confused N10

Ray writes a letter to the editor from his home in Muswell Hill, complaining about the state of Britain today... a recurring theme from the infamous Little Englander.

I close my eyes and lay back and I think of England
I dream about that green and pleasant land we knew as England
That throne of kings, that sceptred isle set in a silver sea
Has turned into a laughing stock divided without harmony

That's why I remain yours truly, confused N10

3. Skint & Demoralised - LS11 OES

I've never been a football fan, but I'm a huge fan of Matt 'Skint & Demoralised' Abbott, and although I've no interest in Leeds United (despite them being a local team to me and the team my dad followed when he was younger) I can hear Abbott's passion in every word of this chant.

2. The Pogues - NW3

I'd love to think this track was an autobiographical account of Shane's arrival in Hampstead...

When I got down to the smoke
It was 1963
I got a job doing meals on wheels
Round NW3
I was terrorising grannies
For ten lousy bob a week
I was smashed and blacked
And drunk and yawning in NW3

...except that he would have been 6 at the time. Still, this is Shane MacGowan we're talking about, so anything's possible.

I stayed in Hampstead once. Walking down the street, I saw the "comedian" Michael McIntyre talking very loudly into his phone. I'm not a violent man, but I had to be physically restrained from punching him hard in the nose.

1. New Model Army - BD3

The track that inspired this particular Top 10, so I thought it deserved to be Number One. Despite working in Bradford for 20+ years of my life, I never really listened to one of the city's biggest bands while I was there (I was always more of a Terrorvision man) but I stumbled across this pretty recently and couldn't stop listening to it. Further investigation required...

We close early when the nights are slow
Hit the Shell garage, Thornton Road
Take a long drive up on the moors
Park up in a place we know
In the back seats getting stoned
To forget everything at home
Mess about with the bleeping phone
Gazing down on the city below
Where no one's really sure if this is home

And it's not where you're from or where you've been
It's not a matter of blood or of family tree
Everybody believes what they want to believe
But they come from some kind of refugee
Running from something, turned out of somewhere
All looking for somewhere, exiled from something
And no one's really sure if this is home

Very appropriate lyrics for anyone living in Bradford. Unfortunately, when I google search Pudsey (BD3), all I get is hundred of pictures of the Children In Need bear. The video below is probably more accurate...



Know any other songs named after postcodes? Send your answers on a postcard.

My Top Ten John Hurt Songs

I'm not going to go off on one about losing another hero of my youth. Last year was a bad one, but I think we all have to accept now, this is going to happen with greater frequency as we count down to our own departures. Facts of life, and all that.

Never mind, here's ten songs in tribute to The Elephant Man, Kane, Winston Smith and The War Doctor...


10. Johnny Cash - Hurt

Let's start with the best song on the list, though in some ways the least relevant. It's a John, and he's Hurt. It seemed to fit the mood too.

9. Biff Bang Pow! - Chocolate Elephant Man

There will be more references to The Elephant Man in this list than any of John Hurt's other films. I'll explain the main reason for that shortly, but there's another reason. The story of John Merrick touched a lot of songwriters and became a metaphor for loneliness, bravery and prejudice.

Released in 1985, Biff Bang Pow!'s song was obviously inspired by John Hurt's starring role in the 1980 film.

8. Todd Rundgren's Utopia - Winston Smith Takes It On The Jaw

I read the other day that Amazon in the USA has currently sold out of George Orwell's 1984.

Todd Rundgren released this, as part of the Utopia album Oblivion back in the actual 1984. When we only had Ronald Reagan to worry about.

See also David Bowie's 1984 and 1984 (Sex Crime) by The Eurythmics, obviously.

7. Catatonia - Hooked

Very early Catatonia single which ends with the Elephant Man sleeping. Shush,

See also Rufus Wainwright's In My Arms for more Victorian hospital beds John Merrick might sleep in.

6. Pet Shop Boys & Dusty Springfield - Nothing Has Been Proved

From the soundtrack of the movie Scandal, in which Hurt played Stephen Ward, the man who took the rap for the Profumo affair, and ended his own life as a consequence.

5. Sparks - I Wish I Looked A Little Better

Another Elephant Man reference, though Ron and Russell turn it into an ode to teenage insecurity...

Turn out the light, yeah, the light
And I might have a chance
I guess I look slightly worse
Than the Elephant Man
Whoa, oh, oh, I wish I looked a little better

4. The Beautiful South - I May Be Ugly

Paul Heaton does the same, for a slightly older man. Full of cruel jokes, masking a much deeper sadness. Which is a great metaphor for the pain we cause when we judge others by their outward deformities.

When you feel like London
And you look like Hull
You think Travolta pulled Newton-John
Who did John Hurt pull?

3. Alt-J - The Gospel of John Hurt

Sigourney Weaver recalls, "All it said in the script was, 'This thing emerges.'"

No space

L-shaped
Tetris
Tile seeking
Somewhere
Oh somewhere
To fit in
Alien

 

Oh, coming out of the woodwork
Chest bursts like John Hurt
Coming out of the woods

2. The Pogues - Sally Maclennane

As you might have guessed, The Elephant Man is my favourite John Hurt performance, and not just because it's directed by David Lynch. A lot of actors would have turned this role into caricature; he found real pathos. I cry every time I watch it.

I already did My Top Ten Elephant Songs though, which included two songs called Elephant Man. I skipped those this time for deeper lyrical references,

But Jimmy didn't like his place in this world of ours
Where the elephant man broke strong men's necks when he'd had too many pours
So sad to see the grieving and the people that I'm leaving
And he took the road for god knows in the morning

1. Art Garfunkel - Bright Eyes

And if you don't fill up every time you hear this, you didn't grow up in the 70s.

There's a high wind in the trees
A cold sound in the air
And nobody ever knows when you go
And where do you start?
Oh, into the dark

Rest in peace, Hazel.

My Top Ten Yeah Yeah Songs

I really wanted to pay tribute to the late Glenn Frey this week (far too many of our heroes are dying young at the moment), but sadly I'm moving house* on Monday so I don't have a spare second. But Glenn... you'll be missed.

(*I would have reposted My Top Ten Songs About Moving House, but as it's only 18 months since our last move - don't ask - it seemed too soon.)

Instead, here's one I prepared earlier...



It all begins with The Beatles... or so they say. Of course, the Beatles didn't invent rock 'n' roll, but maybe they did invent pop music. OK, pop music had been around for a long time before the Fab Four hit the Cavern, but maybe pop music wouldn't mean what it means today if it hadn't been for the Beatles. I dunno, Bob Stanley or someone far smarter than me about pop music will have a theory on that, I'm sure. Anyway, ten songs indebted, one way or another, to the chorus hook of She Loves You, since, if we can only agree on one thing today, it's that the Beatles surely invented the idea of putting more than one yeah together in a song lyric.

Yeah, yeah, yeah...

Oh, and special mention, of course, to Karen O and The Yeah Yeah Yeahs.


10. Spiritualized - Yeah Yeah

"It's like the Kings of Leon..... but good," is the funniest youtube comment I've read this week.

J. Spaceman is still a bit of a dick though. More incisive musical criticism to follow.

9. Cyndi Lauper - Yeah Yeah

Sometimes, even at the height of her fame, Cyndi was a little bit too kooky for her own good.

8. Cheap Trick - Yeah Yeah

Before they became leading lights of the power pop scene, Cheap Trick had more of a hard rock sound on their eponymous debut album in 1977. Twenty years later, they released a second eponymous album which harkened back to their early days. This comes from that.

7. Jackson Browne - Yeah Yeah

This one's only from a couple of years ago, but it sounds like it could have been lifted from Browne's 70s heyday. The guitar also sounds very reminiscent of Warren Zevon's Werewolves of London, but as Browne produced that and was good friends with Warren, we'll let him off.

6. Black Grape - Yeah Yeah, Brother

Dedicated to the woman who betrayed Shaun Ryder.

You wouldn't want that on your cv.

5. The Pioneers - Let Your Yeah Be Yeah

Written and produced by Jimmy Cliff, taking a biblical quotation (Matthew 5:37, scripture fans) and turning it into a chat up line. The reggae original is the most well-known very, but Brownsville Station also did a pretty cool hard-rocking version too.

4. The Pogues - Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah

What if the Pogues had been around in the 60s? They might have appeared on Ready, Steady, Go as in this video recreation... but I don't think Shane would have been allowed to sing, "I love your breasts, I love your thighs".

3. Georgie Fame & The Blue Flames - Yeh Yeh

Clive Powell wasn't a very rock 'n' roll name, was it? Apparently, Clive / Georgie holds an interesting Top Ten record. The only three Top Ten singles he ever scored all went to Number One. He released plenty more singles, but the only ones that got into the Top Ten all went to the top of the chart. This was one of them... I'm sure you can guess the other two.

They Might Be Giants did a great cover of this too.

2. The Wedding Present - Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah

Always willing to go that extra Yeah to get your attention, David Gedge plays International Man of Mystery in this classic Weddoes single from Watusi. 

1. The Flaming Lips - The Yeah Yeah Yeah Song

Just as mental as anything else the Flaming Lips have ever recorded, but with an added political element. Wayne Coyne claims the song isn't only pointing the finger at clueless politicians but also asking us what we would do if we were in the same position.

I never copy stuff word for word from iffypedia, but their description of the video is even more funny than the video itself...

The music video has three segments. In the first, Asian women forcibly tape hamburgers to a businessman and then he is let loose, chased by several shirtless obese men and watched by amused but non-interfering police officers. In the second segment, a woman resembling Gwen Stefani similarly covered by doughnuts (suggesting that the three Asian women are supposed to criticize Stefani's objectification of her entourage of four women who play "Harajuku Girls"), and is chased by the police officers. In the third segment, Wayne Coyne - who portrays a ruthless leader - has raw steaks and some lengths of intestine stapled to him and gets chased by a werewolf.

Which one makes you go Yeah Yeah Yeah? And which one makes you go No No No?

My Top Ten Jean Songs

Ten songs about ladies called Jean... you may be surprised how many of them you know.

Special mentions to Jean-Jacques Burnel, Jean Knight, Wyclef Jean, Jean-Luc Ponty and Jean Michel Jarre (most of whom aren't ladies, but I didn't want them to feel left out).



10. The Pogues - Five Green Queens And Jean

According to the Pogues.com forum, Five Green Queens was a card game Shane used to play in his London flat... and Jean was his landlady. In case you were wondering.

9. Camera Obscura - I Love My Jean

Camera Obscura's take on an old Robert Burns poem - an idea suggested to them by the late, great John Peel. 

8. Warren Zevon - Jeannie Needs A Shooter

From the sublimely titled album Bad Luck Streak in Dancing School, this cool Zevon classic was co-written by Bruce Springsteen. Of whom, more later...

7. Belle & Sebastian - String Bean Jean

The girls have got a house that’s like a caravan
And it’s like your holidays whenever you go round
And we always have a laugh and then we all get in the bath
To save on the leccy bill
Me & Jo & Phil’

When he's cooking with gas, no one can write a lyric quite like Stuart Murdoch...

She asked me “Do I need to lose a bit of weight?”
And I told her “Don’t be stupid ’cause you’re looking great”
And I call her String Bean Jean because the label on her jeans says
Seven to eight years old – well that’s pretty small

6. Julian Cope - Jellypop Perky Jean

At his best, Julian Cope was an 80s alternative Elvis. I like to think that if the King had lived beyond '77, he might have recorded this with Rick Rubin as part of his career renaissance.

5. Eels - Jeannie's Diary

Top unrequited love song from the amazing Mark Oliver Everett - E to his mates.

She could have anything she wants
So why not me?
She could have anything she dreams
Oh, to be one single page
One single page
In Jeannie's diary

 4. David Bowie - Blue Jean

A slab of "sexist rock 'n' roll" according to Bowie, "a song about picking up birds". From the height of his 80s success, this was the first single released after his hugely popular Let's Dance album. (The Musos, of course, claim it's when he sold out.) Although Blue Jean was a big hit too, the rest of the subsequent album (Tonight) was below par for the Dame. 

See also The Jean Genie, arguably a much better song... but it's not about a girl called Jean. It's about Iggy Pop instead.

3. Michael Jackson  - Billie Jean

A song so famous, so spectacular, so era-defining and legendary... it deserves a Top Ten all of its own. Here are 10 amazing facts I found on t'internet (with a couple I knew already - like the Eddie Argos one) about Billie Jean. I don't know if these are all true... but what does truth matter in the iffypedia age?

10. They mixed the song 91 times before they got a version they were happy with.

9. The video was the first by a black artist to receive heavy airplay on MTV... but only after the head of CBS threatened to expose the channel's "racist" playlist policy.

8. Lydia Murdock recorded an answer song called Superstar from the perspective of the Billie Jean character. Like a lot of answer records... it's bloody awful.

7. Much better is Eddie Argos's answer song, Billie's Jeans, recorded by Art Brut side project Everybody Was In the French Resistance...Now! It's told from the perspective of Billie and Michael's grown-up lovechild.

My mother always told me
You, not me, were the mistake
She never regretted the chance she had to take
My mother always told me
Everything you put her through
I told her we're better off without you

She can't have been the only girl
Illegitimate children all over the world
One day you're gonna get caught
And that's an awful lot of child support

6. Kanye West remixed the track for Thriller's 25th anniversary. His version was... bloody awful. Unsurprisingly.

5. Jacko re-recorded the song with new lyrics as part of the Pepsi Generation ad campaign. That was bloody awful too. 

4. Producer Quincy Jones tried to get Jacko to change the song's title to Not My Lover in case anyone thought it was about tennis player Billie Jean King. Jones also got Jacko to overdub some of the vocals while singing through a 6 foot long cardboard tube. Apparently.

3. The song has been covered by everybody from Ian Brown to Chris Cornell to Neil Finn to German punk band The Bates (who turned it into a tribute to Hitchcock's Psycho). The best alternative version must surely come from the much-missed Civil Wars. Gorgeous stuff.

2. Daryl Hall claims Jacko confessed to copying BJ's famous bassline from the Hall & Oates song I Can't Go for That (No Can Do). Hall didn't sue because he'd nicked the bassline himself from somewhere else.

1. Although Jackson claimed the song was written about generic experiences he and his brothers had with groupies, his biographer tells a far more detailed story about a psychotic fan who claimed Jackson was the father of one of her twins (yeah, I had to check that was medically possible). The fan became so obsessed with Jacko she even sent him a gun and asked him to participate in a suicide pact which would allow them to be together in the next life. Jacko framed her photo and hung it above his dining table. Allegedly.

And despite all that, it's still only my third favourite Jean song. But as you've seen, the competition was pretty fierce this week.

2. The Smiths - Jeane

For many years, Jeane was the great lost Smiths song. Available only as a b-side to the original vinyl release of This Charming Man, it took me ages to locate a scratchy second hand copy which I dubbed onto CD-R and eventually ripped to my computer. (I know, vinyl fans, you're shuddering as you read that, aren't you?) It wasn't released on CD until 2008 as part of yet another Best Of compilation, but it was the main reason I bought that disc - I already owned most of the other tracks. (Which proves home taping doesn't stop true fans buying record also.)

Jeane should have been a much bigger song - but with typical Morrissey / Marr perversity, they virtually threw it away. (Let's not forget, this is the band that originally put How Soon Is Now? out as a 12-inch b-side.) It's classic kitchen sink Shelagh Delaney-esque miserablism from Moz with another speeded up rock 'n' roll riff from Johnny. Billy Bragg does a great version too.  

And yes, in most other Top Tens, it would have been Number One.

1. Bruce Springsteen - Bobby Jean

There's some debate in my head about whether Born In The USA deserves a place in my favourite Bruce albums DESPITE the fact it was his bestselling pop global megastar moment. The muso-snob in me will always prefer the album which preceded it (the ultra lo-fi Nebraska, recorded on a tape recorder in his back bedroom) or the one which followed it (the gloomy comedown divorce record, Tunnel Of Love). But if I was going to see Bruce play live again (and I sincerely hope I get another opportunity to do so before he calls it a day for the sake of his knees), I'd rather hear him play Glory Days or Bobby Jean than any of the songs on those other two discs. I'd even settle for Cover Me, and that was rubbish. ('Rubbish' being a relative term where Bruce is concerned.)

On the surface, Bobby Jean is a love song to an old high school girlfriend who may or may not have met a tragic end. Legend has it, however, that the song was written about E Streeter 'Little' Stevie Van Zandt (of the Sopranos and Lilyhammer fame) after he quit the band prior to the release of Born. It's still a love song - but one about missing your old pal after he's gone. Since Little Stevie rejoined the E Street Band, he often takes centre stage with Bruce when this song is performed live.





Next week, the essential sequel: My Top Ten Jeans Songs.

Meanwhile, which Jean is your Harlow... and which is your Hilda Ogden?

My Top Ten Sally Songs

A good friend of mine (who shares my appreciation for fine music) celebrates a very special birthday today. In her honour... ten tunes that share her name.



10. Kerbdog - Sally

Top Irish grunge. Amusing video in which our eponymous heroine does everything she can to rid herself of the annoying band playing outside her flat... wrecking her own home in the process.

Frank Turner does a lovely acoustic cover.

9. Robert Palmer - Sneakin' Sally Through The Alley

Batley Bob gets caught out trying to make excuses for his dalliances with Sally... and for using that most obvious of rhymes in his title. (Gracie Fields has a lot to answer for.)

8. Eric Clapton - Lay Down, Sally

Every time I include an Eric Clapton song on this blog, I feel like I have to apologise for his infamous Enoch Powell rant, the one that labeled him a bigot in the eyes of many. Then again, if I excluded every musician who's ever spoken objectionable twaddle, there'd be far less variety round these parts... and Morrissey would have been banned a long time ago. (Still, Eric... really?)

Lay Down, Sally is a nice chugging guitar tune that probably would have placed higher if it wasn't for my aforementioned reservations.

7. Lou Reed - Sally Can't Dance

Look kids, drugs are bad... m'kay?

6. Father John Misty - This Is Sally Hatchet

A wonderful, Tarantino-esque tale from Father John, with a very Beatlesy groove. This Sally is a killer. You'll be extra careful when slicing up your pizza after watching the video.

5. Flight of the Conchords - Song For Sally

The Conchords are rarely better than when they're arguing over the same girl. Shame she's already engaged to Mark. Still, if he was involved in an accident and Sally got the life insurance money... not that it's about the money, honestly...

Jermaine:

And we'd fall asleep together
And we'd wake up in the sunlight
Well, maybe I'm a dreamer
But maybe one day you'll see
That dreams are-

Bret:

Yeah, yeah
She gets it
Stop cockblocking me!

4. Stone Roses - Sally Cinnamon

A Birdsy jangle from Brown & Squire. I'm never quite clear whether this particular Sally really is Ian's world... or whether he's just picking her pocket on the train.

3. Little Richard - Long Tall Sally

Classic rock 'n' roll song about grassing up your uncle 'cos he's cheating on poor old Aunt Mary with the eponymous tall, bald-headed lady who's not built for comfort, she's built for speed.

Some fun tonight.

2. Wilson Pickett - Mustang Sally

Due to a typo when making my shortlist in preparation for this Top Ten, I almost forgot this stone cold masterpiece completely. What a crime that would have been. The Wicked Pickett in all his soulful, screeching glory. Phew. That was a close one.

And the moral is: don't give a girl you fancy a new car just to get a free ride. Who knows who else she might take for a spin?

1. The Pogues - Sally MacLennane

Shane Macgowan's finest hour? The lyrics to Sally MacLennane are witty, joyous and wistfully nostalgic. It's the story of Jimmy, an old harmonica-playing pal who leaves town twice, the latter time never to return.

He soothed the souls of psychos and the men who had the horn

...has to be one of the greatest lines in the history of pop, surely?

It took me many years to discover that the titular Sally wasn't a lady at all but a pint of stout. But then, you'd expect nothing else from Shane.




So... which Sally is the pride of your alley?