The List #1

In 1992, INXS released their best album, Welcome To Wherever You Are. It contains the somewhat prescient song, Not Enough Time. When I hear this song in my head, it goes "Not enough time for all that I want to do" (although the actual lyrics are slightly different). Those lyrics pop into my head more and more frequently as the clock ticks ever onward... in a similar fashion to the way the lyrics to We Have All The Time In The World fill my mind whenever I'm in a rush to get somewhere and I find myself stuck behind a Louis. 

I sometimes wonder if I like too much music. If I'd be better off if my tastes were more niche and not so varied. Because there really is NOT ENOUGH TIME to listen to everything I want to listen to. Every time I visit the tube of you, a new band pops up demanding my attention. On first listen, a lot of them sound intriguing... like this lot, who may well be of some interest to Martin...

Brigitte Calls Me Baby appear to be the latest in a long, long, long line of bands who want to sound like The Smiths. But how many of those ever made it big? Suede? Gene? (Not really.) The Killers? (As soon as they did, they stopped trying to sound like The Smiths.) 

Lead singer Wes Leavins (with his enormous Morrissey quiff) claims to be more influenced by Sinatra, Orbison and Presley... ✔, ✔, ✔... but it's The Smiths I hear (and see) in the videos above and below... and that's why they're on the list.

Brigitte Calls Me Baby - Impressively Average

"The List." 

Often, when I hear a song I like on another blog, I'll leave a comment saying "That's going on the list." Similarly, when I hear something interesting on the radio. Like this little beauty from Irish singer-songwriter Ultan Conlon...

I like the folky atmosphere on that, and the idea that if we don't keep the old songs alive (whether they be Raglan Road or Girls Just Wanna Have Fun), they'll fade from our collective consciousness. I used to enjoy listening to the late Desmond Carrington on Radio 2. He'd play a really diverse mix of music, some of it old and forgotten from the 30s, 40s or 50s, alongside more recent or well known choices. I heard things on his show I'd never heard before on the radio, and probably never will again. 

As Ultan puts it...

Who's gonna play the old songs when all the old-timers are gone?

Here's an old song I've been playing a lot lately...

See? It's all too much, isn't it? Imagine if I just liked indie music, or rock, or old soul, or country and Americana... if I specialised in power pop or new wave or gentle, acoustic singer-songwritery stuff. Then I'd be able to focus. I'd be able to concentrate on one thing and enjoy it for what it is and not always be worrying about finding the next new thing... or the next old thing... in the hope it might hit me like a chaise longue or gradually unveil its beauty over a half dozen listens like the best of Jason Isbell.

Jason Isbell - Cast Iron Skillet

But I don't just like one thing. I like all kinds of different things, and being able to switch genres and keep it fresh is essential in my listening. But then I also like digging back into the archives too. Except when do I have the time? I mentioned at the top of the page that Welcome To Wherever You Are is the best album INXS ever made. And yet I'm making that assessment safe in the knowledge that I haven't listened to it all the way through in 30 years. But The List keeps growing, and it's growing from all sides. New things, old things that are new to me, old things that I know but I haven't listened to in ages... and on and on and on...

Take that lot, for instance. Life are from Hull. Let's not hold that against them, because on the evidence of the track above... they're excellent. Bear in mind that they released that two years ago and this is the first time I've come across them, but they already appear to have released three albums. What if they're all as good as that song? I ought to drop everything else this instance and devote the next three weeks to familiarising myself with their back catalogue... but I haven't got the time because I also have to check out these guys...

L.A. Edwards come from... erm, Los Angeles... although the LA doesn't stand for what you think - it's lead singer Luke Andrew's initials. They supported Lucinda Williams last weekend and as soon as I heard them, I knew I wanted to hear more. So they've gone on The List.

L.A. Edwards - Good Luck

There's so much music out there waiting to be discovered, it's a truly daunting prospect. Because what if I never hear that one song that changes my life forever? It's out there somewhere, I know it is. That's why I have The List...

L7 - Shitlist

Double Vision - List 99

The Go-Gos - Girl Of 100 Lists

Toby Keith - My List

Los Campesinos! - My Year In Lists

The Boxmasters - Shit List

Self-Help For Cynics #19: Playing It Safe

Iggy Pop - Play It Safe

I clearly remember the first time I walked into a classroom as a trainee teacher. It was an adult Functional Skills English workshop, and all the students were quietly getting on with a variety of tasks in groups. It wasn't at all what I'd expected, and when the teacher I'd come to shadow said to me, "just go round the groups and see if anyone needs any help", I was suddenly terrified. 

Just... walk up to complete strangers who didn't know me from Adam - many of whom were older than me, and of a variety of different ethnicities - introduce myself and offer them help? I'd prepared myself for standing at the front of a class and delivering a lesson to a group of teenagers. I had lots of experience in performance and presentation and making myself heard or noticed... but a quiet, casual chat with a gentle offer of assistance to grown-ups... that was well outside my comfort zone. 

Beth Orton - Safety

Those of you who have been following this series from the start will know that we've identified the main culprit of our stress, anxiety and other mental health concerns... the amygdala or monkey brain. To recap...

Whenever the amygdala senses any kind of threat – from a bus about to run us over in the street to somebody gossiping about us behind our back in the office – it sets off our spider-sense, various hormonal and neurological warning signals that in turn cause us to feel the symptoms of stress. These will vary depending on the individual and the situation, but they include all the old favourites – physical stuff such as increased heart rate, changes to breathing, hot or cold sweat, and mental reactions such as fear, anger and shame. Stress hormones basically prepare us to fight the threat or flee from the danger: fight or flight. But they often override our normal, logical human brain, and let our monkey brain take over. 

The problem comes in the modern world, where the monkey brain finds it increasingly difficult to work out what's an actual threat to life... and what's merely a difficult problem to be overcome. So it looks to us for understanding... and we don't help ourselves by playing it safe.

The Airborne Toxic Event - Safe

In theory, any new experience contains danger. Meeting new people, starting a new job, going out on a first date, trying a new hobby or club... life would be so much easier if we just stuck with the stuff we know and are comfortable with. Anything new - well, we don't know how to deal with it or what problems we might encounter along the way. And that's scary.

Emmy The Great - Bad Things Coming, We Are Safe

Writing this particular blog series is a bit like that. Every time I sit down to do it, I'm forcing myself out of my comfort zone. I'm not really an expert on this subject, I'm just fumbling my way through. It would be so much easier when I open up my computer to just cobble together another edition of Saturday Snapshots or Namesakes. I know how to do those now. They might take time and research and a bit of head-scratching, but they're familiar and comforting and safe. 

Or, I might put off writing the blog altogether and go watch some TV. Read a book (if only!). Watch some more music videos on youtube from bands I've never heard of. 

Hot Rod Circuit - Safely

If I do any of these things rather than writing the post that's causing me a bit of anxiety, I'm confirming the monkey's perception of threat.

Massive Attack - Safe From Harm

New experience? !!Amygdala sends out warning signals!!

Result: I feel anxious.    

Strategy? Play it safe. 

Safety strategies are the things we all do to minimise risk or avoid tackling anything new. They include distracting ourselves with other (safe) activities or avoiding any situations that make us feel remotely uncomfortable. 

Thea Gilmore - When Did You Get so Safe?

However... whenever we do this, we tell the monkey that it was right - its perception of threat was bang on the money. As a result, it'll double its efforts to warn us about getting into that situation again. 

If I stop writing this blog series because it's difficult and it makes me a little anxious, then next time I try, it'll be even harder.

If I avoid going out to a gig because there will be a lot of strange people there, and it'll be a late night, and I might not get home till after midnight... if I decide to stay at home instead and watch TV... then chances are, next time the opportunity arises, I probably won't even bother to buy tickets.

The House Of Love - Safe

These are pretty mild examples, but I'm sure you can extrapolate them to cover more serious anxiety-causing situations in your own life. Playing it safe, avoiding problems or distracting ourselves from things that are worrying just confirms to our monkey brain that these things are threats to be avoided. It'll scream even louder next time. 

The Chameleons - A Person Isn't Safe Anywhere These Days

Taken to an absolute extreme, this is where OCD comes from: you can't leave the house until you've completed these safety rituals. It's where alcohol and drug dependency starts: you feel less anxious when you have a drink. The monkey brain experts believe that even positive behaviour like exercise, meditation and structured relaxation techniques can be used as an escape strategy to help us avoid facing up to the things we fear... because when we do these things, we only confirm that the monkey was right to be afraid.

Graham Parker - Fear Not

The answer? "Feel the fear and do it anyway." 

Back in the 90s, a former colleague of mine used to swear by a self-help book with that exact title... and I used to mock it as namby-pamby mumbo-jumbo. Yet from a brain science point of view, it seems like this is the best advice you can get. If we refuse to let our anxiety get the better of us - if we embrace the situation the monkey is screaming at us to avoid - and we do this repeatedly... then, we break down the cycle of anxiety and we teach the monkey that it's something we don't have to be afraid of. 

Howie Beck - Don´t Be Afraid

Those early teaching experiences were really quite terrifying. I'd already pushed myself way out of my comfort zone by going back to university in my late 30s and retraining at something so different from anything I'd ever done before. I'd prepared myself for all kinds of problems and scenarios and figured out ways I might deal with them... but a workshop of adult learners, something that should have been far less scary than standing in front of a class of 17 year olds... that was almost my downfall. I came out of that first shadowing session and seriously asked myself if I'd made the right decision. Maybe teaching wasn't the right choice for me. Except it was too late to drop out now... and what else could I do?

The Carpenters - Don't Be Afraid

The following week, I went back to the same class and was put in the same situation again. And it wasn't immediately easier. It took me a good few weeks before I worked out how to handle myself there, but eventually I did... and my anxiety subsided. Because I'd taught my monkey brain that it was OK. It wasn't something to be afraid of. 

Boston - Don't Be Afraid

In her book, Don't Feed The Monkey Mind, Dr. Jennifer Shannon explains...

The monkey mind is like a small child or a pet watching you for guidance. I emphasize the word "watch". You cannot tell this part of your brain anything. The monkey can't be reasoned with, comforted, or distracted from its mission. The only way we can get what we want in live is to override its warnings with our behaviour.

Stop playing it safe, in other words. Playing it safe only reinforces our fears. 

Easier said than done...?

Celebrity Jukebox #71: Burt Bacharach

What the world needs now is another tribute to one of the most important musicians of the 20th Century. From his peerless work with lyricist Hal David to later collaborations with Carole Bayer Sager, Neil Diamond and Elvis Costello, Burt Bacharach created an unparalleled songbook of timeless classics. What can I say that hasn't already been said by far more erudite folk than me?

How about sitting back and listening to a few tributes from the Celebrity Jukebox? And who better to start with than... The Quo?!?

Hardly going to beat that, am I?

Maybe not, but I was pleased to find that a number of my favourite artists happily name dropped Burt B. in their lyrics. For example...

Aimee Mann - It Takes All Kinds

I would like to keep this vision
Of you intact,
When we'd hang around and listen
To Bacharach
And you loved the world you lived in
And it loved you back

Thea Gilmore - Saviours And All

It's closing time
And the drunks sing some stray lines of Bacharach
It's too late now to even out the score
You drain the glass and raise your hand for more
So I'll take cover while you just take the floor

Jens Lekman - If You Ever Need a Stranger (To Sing at Your Wedding)

If you ever need a stranger
To sing at your wedding
A last minute choice then I am your man
I know every song, you name it
By Bacharach or David
Every stupid love song that's ever touched your heart
Every power ballad that's ever climbed the charts

Weezer - Do You Wanna Get High?

Do you wanna get high?
It's like we're falling in love
We can listen to Bacharach
And stop at any point

They Might Be Giants - You Culture Killed My Dog

Bacharach and David
Used to write his favourite songs
Never, never, never would he worry
He'd run and fetch the ball

Cracker - Shine

You'll be a Russian acrobat
You'll be like Burt Bacharach
You come to the party, you say "What's new pussycat?"
Someday you're gonna shine
You'll see

Then, if we look a little further than just the usual suspects, we find this eccentric selection with lyrics that scratched my itch...

Riffer - That's The Kind Of Room

Now that's the kind of room
I'd like to fill with Burt Bacharach music
The look of love
Is in your eyes

Remember when Burt was married to Angie Dickenson
Can't you see her
Angie's in an evening gown
Drinking scotch on the rocks
Those rocks are clinking as she walks across the room
"The Look of Love" rises from Burt's piano
Oh, what a muse!

Eva B. Ross - On My Way Out

But oh you could fool me into staying
Talking in the corner, hating all the music playing
I like the Rockmes and Bacharach
And I'd happily burn a playlist with an explanation 
Track for track

Particularly fond of this next one...

SE Webster - Already Gone

Meet me in the backwoods, we're going after dark
We're digging a hole in the ground, there's no need to worry at all
You ask too many questions like, "who's it for?" etcetera
C'mon, you must know you're already gone
Just think back to Bacharach & chocolate-covered strawberries
Since you seem to think it's our only good memory
You say you've been done around here
No need to repeat, you've made it perfectly clear
That you're already gone

All of which leads us back to where we started, songs that mention Burt in the title. Can anyone compete with the Quo? You decide...

Snuff - Bacharach

Beaumont - Bacharach

Fitness Forever - Bacharach

Bigott - Bar Bacharach

The Worn Flints - Burt Bacharach

Today's best discovery comes from "Withington's Burt Bacharach", Chris Keaney and his Electric Lovehandles. Let's just say that bandcamp purchases ensued. This is proving an expensive feature for me...

My Top Twenty-One of 2021: #18

18. Afterlight - Afterlight / Thea Gilmore - The Emancipation of Eva Grey

Painful break-up records account for some of the best albums ever released... but Thea Gilmore took that to a new level this year. 

2021 actually saw two releases from Thea: her "final" album, a jazzy show-stopper channeling Billie Holliday, Liza Minelli and Noel Coward (inspired by her contribution to the soundtrack of the latest movie version of Blithe Spirit)... and the first "post-Thea" record, Afterlight, a much darker affair that is at times as painfully raw and confrontational as Nick Cave's Skeleton Tree.

Having followed Thea's career since the beginning, I found the revelations on Afterlight to be shocking, and although it's an important, cathartic piece of art, I think I'll end up returning more to the playfulness of the Eva Grey record, in the same way that I can acknowledge Skeleton Tree as among Cave's best, but I'm probably not going to listen to it much again . Still, whatever Thea, or Afterlight, does next, I wish her well. She's free now... the sky's the limit.

My Top Twenty-One of 2021: #19

Today is the 15th anniversary of my life as a blogger. My first ever blog post (not here, but on this blog's predecessor, Sunset Over Slawit) was dated December 3rd 2006.

My how things have changed. One thing that hasn't is my need to record my favourite albums of the year in December. Here's the Top Ten from 2006, complete with my commentary...

10. Teddy Thompson – Separate Ways. Released at the back end of last year, but the singles came out in ’06. Mature, emotional song-writing… not entirely in his dad’s class (and obviously he can’t play guitar like Pops – who can?), but he deserves to stand on his own.

9. The Crimea – Tragedy Rocks. Also released back-end of 2005, this is a new band led by former Crocketts lead-singer Dave McManus. From what I remember of The Crocketts, they had one really good song. Here, there’s a whole album of them.

8. Belle & Sebastian – The Life Pursuit. Not as strong as (and less commercially successful than) Dear Catastrophe Waitress (maybe I’m just a sucker for Trevor Horn), but a definite grower. Stuart’s decision to let the rest of the band chip in with some of the songwriting might have something to do with this. Saw them live this year and it was all a bit of a shambles, but enjoyably so.

7. Jarvis Cocker – Jarvis. Very excited to finally have Jarvis back, and half this album is really strong. The other half, while good, strives a little too hard to be… well, not commercial, because I think he’s given up on that… but perhaps the word I’m looking for is ‘tuneful’. Jarv made a big deal before the record came out that it wasn’t going to be just him whinging on about life, that there would be some proper songs in there too. I’d have preferred more of the whinging!

6. Monkey Swallows The Universe – The Bright Carvings. Saw this lot supporting Richard Hawley earlier this year, and although they looked like a bunch of sixth-formers, they made a lovely noise. 

5. Thea Gilmore – Harpo’s Ghost. The critics call her “the best British singer-songwriter of the last ten years” and I find it hard to disagree. Unfortunately, we seem to be the only ones listening. She’s hard working too – when I saw her live this autumn, she was 35 weeks pregnant, and she’s back on the road in the New Year.

4. Morrissey – Ringleader Of The Tormentors. Only Number 4? Moz, you’re slipping! No, ROTT was a good album, but just didn’t have the staying power of YATQ. 

3. The Arctic Monkeys – Whatever People Say I Am, That’s What I’m Not. Far too much has been written about them already… if only this album didn’t live up to the hype!

2. The Handsome Family – The Last Days Of Wonder. Grower of the year. I’ve been a HF fan for ages, and couldn’t get into their new one at first… but now, I just can’t stop. Rennie Sparks is one of the best short story writers stuck in a songwriter’s body you’ll ever encounter, and her husband Brett looks and sings like Walter from The Big Lebowski. An album about the life of Nikola Tesla, the frustrations of being a ghost, and falling in love with the girl at the drive-thru window.

1. The Divine Comedy – Victory For The Comic Muse. Sometimes it seems the better a songwriter gets, the fewer people listen. That certainly seems to be the case with Neil Hannon, who delivered possibly his strongest record to date this year, then shot himself in the foot by releasing its weakest track (‘Diva Lady’) as the lead single. A collection that is in turn touching (‘Lady Of A Certain Age’), hilarious (‘To Die A Virgin’), quirky (‘Arthur C. Clarke’s Mysterious World’, which I still think could have been a crossover hit in the vein of ‘National Express’ if he’d bothered to release it), inspiring (‘Light Of Day’) and literate (‘The Plough’). He also gave us the year’s best b-sides, which could easily have placed a second album in this Top Ten had he compiled them. Great live too, possibly my gig of the year.. I do hope he makes enough money to keep at it!

And now back to the present...

19. Smith & Burrows - Only Smith & Burrows Is Good Enough

Here's one that probably won't appear on many year end lists, more's the pity. Tom Smith is the lead singer of The Editors. Andy Burrows was the drummer in Razorlight, but don't hold that against him. He was also the drummer in We Are Scientists. And he played drums in David Brent's band, so give the guy some credit. He'll work with anyone!

Lately though, he's been doing more of the singer-songwriter thing, with a particular penchant for the 70s. It's therefore not completely absurd to call this record a modern day version of Godley & Creme... or maybe even Wax... which is about as uncool as you can get.

But I like uncool.

Ten catchy, quirky pop songs that feel like they've fallen out of a time warp. You might need to give them a few listens, but they soon work their way under your skin...

 

2021 Contenders: No More Thea

I've been a fan of Thea Gilmore since I first heard the track Heart String Blues on a magazine compilation back in 2002. I subsequently bought the album it came from, Songs From The Gutter, along with its three predecessors, and have snapped up every record she's released since. I've seen her live a couple of times, and even (back when I had more money) supported her pre-patreon online fan-funding platform, from which I received some cool exclusives, including a page of handwritten lyrics... which are kicking around here somewhere.

So I was shocked to learn that later this year, Thea will release her final album, The Emancipation of Eva Grey, followed by her first post-Thea Gilmore record, Afterlight.

Here are the facts as I understand them...

When she was 16, Thea was discovered by a record producer. They eventually married and had two children. The couple separated in 2019 and finally divorced earlier this year.

And now, Thea Gilmore is no more. Now she is Afterlight. To quote from her website...

"After the stop comes the start. After the dark; the light. This is not a drill. Afterlight is a real account of one woman’s journey from impressionable 16-year-old bound into a toxic working and romantic relationship with a man 23 years her senior, to a brand new artist and free woman finding her own beginning."

The spoken word opening track is the only music we've had from the debut Afterlight album this far, but it's a powerful and brutally affecting piece of songwriting, heralding what must surely be one of the most important albums of the year.

As a long time fan, I'm horrified by all this... but also happy that Thea / Afterlight has been afforded this new beginning. I will continue to follow her career wherever it takes her... hopefully to much happier times.

   

Hot 100 #47

My big plan of hosting installment #47 of this countdown on the date of my 47th birthday fell apart somewhat due to last week's lurgy... that'll teach me to try and make this blog appear organised. Oh well, I'm just about back in the land of the living today, so let's climb back on the horse.

Thanks for all the get well / birthday wishes in the meantime.

The logo at the top of the page comes from Indonesia metal Band AK47. It seemed an appropriate place to start since a couple of you suggested machine-gun related tunes, starting with Jim in Dubai who offered this interesting take on an old Buffalo Springfield number...

Oui 3 - For What It's Worth

Hold Your Fire Put Down Your Weapon, 

You'll Never Get to Heaven With An AK-47

C also dug out a couple of cool tunes referencing Rambo's favourite weapon, to wit...

Manic Street Preachers - Kevin Carter

Hi Time magazine, Hi Pulitzer Prize
Tribal scars in Technicolor
Bang bang, club AK 47 hour

Thievery Corporation - 33 Degree

Lethal make me lethal, I'm a weapon
Danger make me danger AK-47

Finally on the machine gun front, Martin offered this - always get extra points for a bit of Thea...

Thea Gilmore - Apparition No 12

And I caught the glimmer in a hurricanes eye I've seen these AK-47's with their noses to the sky  

Before all the bullets started flying, Lynchie was actually first in last time with this suggestion...

Bo Diddley - Who Do You Love? has to be a contender:

I walk 47 miles of barbed wire
I use a cobra-snake for a necktie
I got a brand new house on the roadside
Made from rattlesnake hide
I got a brand new chimney made on top
Made out of a human skull
Now come on take a walk with me, arlene
And tell me, who do you love?

Phew - you'd almost be better off taking your chances with a machine gun. Rigid Digit also suggested versions of this song by George Thorogood, Quicksilver Messenger Service, The Band and Jesus & Mary Chain. You can google those yourself though.

The Swede, bereft of Dylan this week, offered this...

June Richmond - 47th Street Jive... and what a great little clip I just found for it.

Martin came up with a few more great suggestions this week too...

Ben Folds Five - One Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces

September '75 I was 47 inches high

(One of my favourites, that!)

Elton John - Island Girl

I see your teeth flash, Jamaican honey so sweet, 

Down where Lexington cross 47th Street

They Might Be Giants - Till My Head Falls Off

There were 87 Advil in the bottle now there's 30 left. 

I ate 47 so what happened to the other 10?

Kate Bush - 50 Words For Snow which, frankly, could feature here every week from now on...

Yeah, but to save me the effort, I might draw a line under that one now.

Finally, our Canadian correspondent (and fellow 47 year old), Douglas McLaren, suggested two more lyrical 47s. First this...

Nick Lowe - Born Fighter

Shoe shopping, lapping up the grooms and uppers
I don't want to have to get
Another pair of hush puppies
I keep on looking at 47-each
But one day, I'll be laughing
With the lizards on my feet

And then this, to which George remarked "there are some truly terrible songs that you could post, probably none worse than..."

Genesis - Aisle of Plenty

Discount groceries ahoy!

My own record collection threw up a few other suggestions this week, namely these...

Mark Kozelek - Metropol 47

Dwight Twilley - 47 Moons

But the one I went with in the end was this lovely Guy Clark song, also covered by Johnny Cash on the album Look At Them Beans, which surely deserves a cover shot here...

Time was I had a rule about not posting songs with years in them, but surely we've all forgotten that rule by now?


Some of you might expect Toots & The Maytals to make a return appearance next week, but I'm afraid I can't let the same song win two different numbers. Fortunately I have another strong contender for 46 in mind... you might have others. Feel free to throw them my way.

Saturday Snapshots #54 - The Answers

This Is Love that makes you come back to play Saturday Snapshots, I know it is. Whether you're Man-Size or a 50 Ft Queenie, you know This Mess We're In can only be solved by working out the answers... and you never let me down. Early bird prize goes to No-Lie-Ins Lynchie, with Alyson & Walter both sharing a respectable two and a quarter in joint second place. Although if I was being really mean, I might knock a smidgen of Alyson's mark off for not getting the full title of our Number One (including parenthesis). Charity Chic and Rigid Digit mopped up the rest this week.

Thanks for playing, as always.



10. Untie 6-E = foundations x 2.

Untie untie 6 and take away the e and eventually you might end up with...

Unit 4 + 2 - Concrete & Clay

Video of the week!

9. Tough stereos are invincible.

A tough stereo would be a hard-fi.

Someone invincible is hard to beat.

Hard-Fi - Hard To Beat

8. Get beaten up riding up to the top of the mountain.

You ride to the top of a mountain on a chairlift.

Getting beaten up leaves you with bruises.

Chairlift - Bruises

Yes, Lynchie, there is a band called Chairlift.

7. Sad stoat greets early Wham! song.

Sad stoat = blue mink.

The Wham! song is Freedom.

An early greeting would be Good Morning.

Blue Mink - Good Morning Freedom

6. How do I feel about an open, honest pickett?

Open & honest is frank.

Pickett is Wilson.

Frank Wilson - Do I Love You? 

5. No chance of parole in a French prison when Chamberlain left Take That.

If you've no chance of parole, it's life. What's that in French?

Robbie left Take That.

Chamberlain was Neville.

Robbie Nevil - C'est La Vie

4. Noel and Liam stay up late thinking deeply about miserable faces.

Mull over dour faces.

Maria Muldaur - Midnight At The Oasis

3. Hunky monks go jogging alone.

All-man brothers. Geddit?

The song was a little harder.

The Allman Brothers - No One To Run With

2. Adolescent admirers meet a philosopher with a heart of gold.

Teenage Fanclub, obviously.

Neil Jung, obviously.

Teenage Fanclub - Neil Jung

1. Definite & indefinite TV girls try to remember a tragic heroine.

The definite article is The.

The indefinite article is A.

The Gilmore Girls was an American TV show.

Juliet was the tragic heroine.

(Try to remember = Keep That In Mind.)



Saturday Snapshots will return next week. You can't get Rid Of Me that easily.

The United Kingdom of Song #4: Oldham

A short drive over the Pennines from where I live would once have taken you straight into Lancashire, and one of the first towns you'd come to would be Oldham. A touchy subject that, because Oldham ceased to be a Lancashire town back in 1974 when it was swallowed whole by the sprawling beast that is Greater Manchester. Oldham elders still bear the scars.

Musically, Oldham gave birth to The Inspiral Carpets, N-Trance and Bernard Cribbins.

Lyrically, I found more songs that mentioned Will Oldham or Andrew Loog Oldham than the town itself, but Thea Gilmore's My Beautiful Defence does find her "in a café on Oldham Street"... although that still probably isn't in the town itself.

Thank heaven then for Hull-born Everything But The Girl whose song Anytown starts out by mourning the loss of individuality to many northern towns...

Over dale and over hills
I'll take you through the cotton mills
To the ginnels where we played
And where are friendships all were made

Still they came and tore them down
And now we live in Anytown
They came and tore it down
And now this place could be Anytown

...before Tracy reveals in the song's closing moments...

Summer in the driving rain

I can hear the Oldham train.

300 miles from Oldham, next week, down to the south east coast to pay tribute to a recently departed visitor who immortalised our destination in song.

Talky Songs #7 - Don't Set Foot Over The Railway Track

Today's talky song comes from the first Thea Gilmore album I bought, 2005's Songs From The Gutter. Luckily, I bought the limited edition 2 disc version which had this tucked away on disc 2 - a poem Thea wrote in reaction to a parliamentary debate at the time about the social divide. There are a couple of short excerpts from that debate included in the recording and although I can't find anything to identify the speaker... it does sound a hell of a lot like Theresa May. It could be Ann Widdecombe though. It's definitely some heartless Tory git.

7. Thea Gilmore - Don't Set Foot Over The Railway Track

Don't set foot over the railway track

The heathens and the spin doctors are waiting round the back

The skies are always sullen and rain races to the tarmac

So don't set foot over the railway track

Don't set foot over the railway track

The grass isn't green, it's yellow and the pavement is all cracked

The graveyard's in a coma, the church has got the blues

And Jesus has a nose-ring and Mary has tatoos

And girls paint their skins like corpses and have hair ot scouring wire

And the men all look like demons, see them dancing round their fires

Every door has leprosy, every house has got the clap

So, don't set foot over the railway track

Don't set foot over the railway track

Hope you've not been speaking to the wrong kind of people, Jack

They'll screw you son as look at you if you let them gain a foot

This line's God almighty's way of saying that you'll stay just where you're put

'Cause they're all paid up party members with a red streak like a river

They're all standing there on their side saying "promise and deliver"

They are papering their walls with pages of Kerouac

So, don't set foot over the railway track

No, don't set foot over the railway track

Apparently, Thea was never particularly happy with her own delivery of the poem... which is why she chose to re-record it 10 years later with someone much better suited to delivering such material... the great John Cooper-Clarke. Listen to his version - it could well be one of his own poems! Great piece of writing, Thea.

Radio Songs #29: You're The Radio

Where were we?

The Traffic Girl. She had a boyfriend. And then she didn't...

"They've split up," her friend told me.

"She really likes you," her friend told me.

"You should ask her out," her friend told me.

Well, that rather put me on the spot, didn't it? I mean, that was exactly what I wanted to do... but it was also the last thing I wanted to do. Because asking someone out is pretty fucking terrifying. Especially when you're 18 and you've never done it before, but it seems like everyone else has been doing it for years.

But somehow, after a sleepless night or two, I plucked up the courage. I remember waiting out in that pale, artificially lit, underground corridor (sounds pretty creepy, huh?) for her to make the short walk down from Traffic to Studio A. I remember the butterflies... no, the bats... no, the pterodactyls that were circling and swirling in my stomach. I don't remember the words I used... but I do remember that she said yes.

YES.

YES!!!

And that was it. Probably the greatest moment of my life (up to that point). Or it certainly felt that way. Bloody teenage hormones.

Keen students of human nature will probably have guessed the ending to this story already, but there are two more chapters. First, the date.

My FIRST date.

Then...

29. Thea Gilmore - You're The Radio

You can always rely on Thea to put lyrics to the confusion of emotional entanglements. This was the lead single from her 2010 album Murphy's Heart.

I was hope gone to the dogs
Seven hundred ways to sing the blues
Cue the princes and the frogs
Cue those Capulets and Montagues...

 

I'm the joker in the pack
I've been waiting for the perfect time
You're the ace and you're the jack
You're the reason baby, I'm the rhyme...

 

I'm the song, you're the radio!

The Neverending Top Ten #9: Fire Safety Advice from a 4 Year Old

The house Health & Safety officer (Louise) has been trying to impress upon Sam the dangers of electricity, hot water and fire. You know: don't turn light switches on when your fingers are wet. Don't touch the hot tap. Don't stick your fingers in plug sockets. Don't put a metal poker on a three bar electric fire to see what happens.*

*This last one isn't really aimed at Sam as we have neither a poker nor a three bar fire in our house. However, I grew up in a house with a coal fire and often mucked about with the poker, sometimes getting it red hot and using it to torture Star Wars figures. One time we went away on a holiday to a cottage where there was an old fireplace which had had a three bar electric fire placed in front of it... though for some reason they still had a poker next to it. For scientific purposes, I decided to see what would happen if I placed said metal poker on the coils of said electric fire.

The answer: sparks will fly.

Somehow I lived to tell the tale, although I did short out all the electricity in the holiday cottage.

Anyway, in reply to a recent piece of fire safety advice from Mum, Sam came out with an excellent response...

"Do y'know - Johnny Cash fell into a ring of fire, so you have to be careful...'

See? He already knows more than his dad!

However, I do feel vindicated. Because expanding Sam's musical knowledge also benefits other aspects of his life! What's next? Here's ten pieces of fatherly advice... specially for those of you who lament the days when every post on this blog was a Top Ten.


10. Don't Eat The Yellow Snow


9. Don't Drive Drunk


8. Don't Fence Me In


7. Don't Believe What You Read


6. Don't Go To Strangers


5. Don't Jump In Front Of My Train


4. Don't Stare At The Sun


3. Don't Set Foot Over The Railway Track


2. Don't Make Fun Of Daddy's Voice

And obviously...

1. Don't Fall Into A Ring Of Fire...



Any Health & Safety songs in your collection?

My Top Ten Lauren Bacall Songs

"You know how to whistle, don't you, Steve? You just put your lips together and blow"

Quite a few of the songs featured in My Top Ten Humphrey Bogart Songs also made mention of his fourth wife and the greatest love of his life, Lauren Bacall. So you might think I'd struggle to put together a Lauren Bacall Top Ten without some crossover. Au contraire...


10. Kevin Roth - Just Like Lauren Bacall

She knew 
Just what to do
When the boys came...

I will hold my hand up and say that I'd never heard of Kevin Roth until very recently. Iffypedia doesn't tell me much about him either, other than he's "is an American folk singer and Appalachian dulcimer player who has released forty-five albums".

FORTY-FIVE ALBUMS? Dude needs a bigger iffypedia page.

9. ABC - Love Conquers All

 Another of Sheffield's greatest pop bands...

When Bogart saw Bacall
He knew that love conquers all

8. Alabama 3 - Wade Into The Water

Time for your baptism... Alabama-style.

I got as drunk as Bogart, you were just smokin' like Bacall

7. Kitchens of Distinction - When In Heaven

Imagine what could happen after this drink: I'm wearing wings
Join Lauren Bacall, float up to heaven's gate
Wearing danger smiles. She'll meet with the stars
They'll break down doors
Those shining pearls float off in space
I'm raving beautifully

Well, you're definitely raving, Patrick.

6. Pavlov's Dog - Mersey

Smoothy 70's AOR. You can't beat it.

And all the other times
That I wished that you were here
And everything went crazy
When my head filled up with beer
I played that I was Bogart
And that you were my Bacall
And everything just shattered by curtain call

5. The Clash - Car Jamming

Meanwhile, Joe is certain he saw Lauren Bacall in a traffic jam. There are worse people to get stuck behind.

4. Thea Gilmore - Movie Kisses

Poor old Thea, such a cynic...

Here it is
The not-so-happy-ending
We've done
Our picket fence defending
We did Bogart and Bacall and now the spotlight's gone and anyway
All those movie kisses just last too long

3. The Wedding Present - You Jane

I doubt this will be the last time we'll hear from David Gedge in this particular series...

There’s really no need to explain
He’s Tarzan and you’re Jane
He’s Bogart, you’re Bacall
I’m sure he has it all

2. The Amazing Rhythm Aces - Hit The Nail On The Head

Another forgetten gem from the greatest decade.

I can tell you're from down south
The way you say ya'll
You look at me over your shoulder
Just like Lauren Bacall

1. Jesse Malin - Wendy

One of Jesse's very best. (And he'll be back again tomorrow with another one.)

Wendy took me with a smile
Country lips and Bacall style
Through Tangiers or to Bombay
Her self-portrait in the USA

Which one makes you want to whistle?

My Top Ten Punctuation Songs

Following on from my grammar pedantry Top Ten, here's ten songs celebrating the wonders of punctuation.

Special mentions to Question Mark & The Mysterians, Slash, The Parenthetical Girls and !!! (which is a contender for worst band name ever: how do you even pronounce that?).



10. Discount - Apostrophe

Floridas own Discount. Sorry, I meant Florida's.

Being an English teacher, getting people to use the possessive apostrophe is the bane of my life.

9. The Wombats - Sex & Question Marks

Sex is one big question mark to me too.

Fans of the most inquisitive form of punctuation might also enjoy The Fuzztones - Look For The Question Mark.

8. Wire - Dot Dash

Wire use punctuation as Morse Code. Don't crash!

7. The Beat - Ranking Full Stop

Ranking Roger loved his Full Stops from the very first Beat single, of which this was double-A side with their more-played version of Tears of a Clown. The final full stop comes right at the end of the song though...

6. Spearmint - Punctuation

Today, class, Shirley won't just be teaching us about punctuation... but alliteration too!

Words! 
Alliteration 
Helps you hide inside your head 
Typewriter taps: use it as punctuation 
To escape every grey degrading day of your life

5. The Libertines - Up The Bracket

Pete and Carl in parenthesis. (Pair of annoying chancers?)

4. Thea Gilmore - Punctuation

In legal documents and religious texts, punctuation is all-important. Thea proves that here... 

‘Cause you see, I’ve got this theory that it’s only punctuation
That separates the list from you to me
And you can have your little war of full stops and meritings
But the real power’s in parentheses

3. Amanda Palmer - Ampersand

The ghetto boys are catcalling me
As I pull my keys from my pocket
I wonder if this method of courtship
Has ever been effective
Has any girl in history said
Sure, you seem so nice, let's get it on
Still, I always shock them when I answer
Hi my name's Amanda
And I'm not gonna live my life on one side of an ampersand 

Wonder what Neil Gaiman makes of that philosophy? (Let's not ask him, his answers tend to go on for years without end, like his stories.)

2. Vampire Weekend - Oxford Comma

So the Oxford Comma, if you don't know, is the optional comma you may sometimes use before the 'and' at the end of a list. Used properly, it can avoid confusion and comedy...

Vampire Weekend though, they don't give an f-bomb about it. Philistines.

1. Dan Baird - I Love You, Period

Top single from the former Georgia Satellite in which Dan's affair with his English teacher is curtailed by bad punctuation...

That's the problem with English teachers.They let pedantry get in the way of romance.



Question mark? Exclamation mark!

My Top Ten Trump Victory Songs

As with my Brexit Top Ten, I'm presenting this one without comment... other than the lyrics below.

But if you're reading this blog in the USA and you disagree with some silly limey's verdict of your election result, remember that your constitution still allows me the right to free speech... well, at the moment, anyway.



10. Harry Chapin - Sounds Like America To Me

You see I know when a child is hurting
That silence can be wrong
And I know that when old folks are helpless
I can't just pass along
And I know when someone's hungry
I can't just sing this song
And when I hear somebody crying
I can't just wonder who that it could be
And I hear somebody crying now
And it sure sounds like America to me

9. Angaleena Presley - American Middle-Class

Now daddy can't get his pension or Social Security
Worked thirty damn years in a coal mine feeding welfare families
Struggle hard and hide it well,
You sure ain't rich and you sure as hell ain't poor enough to get one little break
'Cause everything would collapse
 Without the hardworking God-loving members of the American middle class

8. Thea Gilmore - Land of the Free

This land is your land
With one roll of the dice and one guiltless command
Now you're sitting watching TV
Accepting moral direction from a crank shrink with an impressive CV
Your new god is your video screen
Washed up, spun out by and American dream,
Only memories of ghosts that patrol this place
And this land, your land is a terminal case

7. Bruce Springsteen - American Land

The McNicholas, the Posalski's, the Smiths, Zerillis too
The Blacks, the Irish, Italians, the Germans and the Jews
The Puerto Ricans, illegals, the Asians, Arabs miles from home
Come across the water with a fire down below
They died building the railroads, worked to bones and skin
They died in the fields and factories, names scattered in the wind
They died to get here a hundred years ago, they're dyin' now
The hands that built the country were always trying to keep down

6. Gil Scott Heron - Winter In America

And now it's winter
Winter in America
Yes and all of the healers have been killed
Or sent away, yeah
But the people know, the people know
It's winter
Winter in America
And ain't nobody fighting
'Cause nobody knows what to save
Save your soul, Lord knows
From Winter in America

5. Billy Bragg - Help Save The Youth Of America

When the lights go out in the rest of the World
What do our cousins say
They're playing in the sun and having fun, fun, fun
Till Daddy takes the gun away
From the Big Church to the Big River
And out to the Shining Sea
This is the Land of Opportunity
And there's a Monkey Trial on TV

4. Drive-By Truckers - Once They Banned Imagine

Are you now or have you ever been in cahoots with the notion that people can change
When history happens again if you do or you did you’ll be blamed
From baseless inquiry
To no knocking entry
Becoming the law of the land
To half cocked excuses for bullet abuse regarding anything browner than tan

Cause once they banned Imagine it became the same old war its always been
Once they banned Imagine it became the war it was when we were kids

3. Beautiful South - The Sound Of North America

The lyrics of "New York"
May have Frank Sinatra singing
But the rhythm and the melody
Were dead black men swinging

2. Todd Snider - Conservative Christian Right Wing Republican Straight White American Male

Conservative Christian, right wing Republican, straight, white, American male.
Gay bashin’, black fearin’, poor fightin’, tree killin’, regional leaders of sales
Frat housin’, keg tappin’, shirt tuckin’, back slappin’ haters of hippies like me.
Tree huggin’, peace lovin’, pot smokin’, porn watchin’ lazyass hippies like me.
Tree huggin’, love makin’, pro choicen, gay weddin’, widespread diggin’ hippies like me.
Skin colour-blinded, conspiracy-minded, protestors of corporate greed,
We who have nothing and most likely will ‘till we all wind up locked up in jails
By conservative Christian, right wing Republican, straight, white, American males.

1. Queen - Is This The World We Created?

Is this the world we created?
We made it on our own
Is this the world we devastated, right to the bone?
If there's a God in the sky looking down
What can he think of what we've done
To the world that He created?

My Top Ten Pirate Songs

Ahoy and avast, me hearties... get a load of this booty!

Special mentions to Johnny Kidd & The Pirates, Pete & The Pirates, Peggy Sue & The Pirates and The Streets - Original Pirate Material.



10. Ocean Colour Scene - Policemen & Pirates

Close your eyes and it's 1996 again, we're all still young and the world's our pearl-filled oyster.

9. Jimmy Buffett - A Pirate Looks At 40

Speaking of feeling one's age...

Yes I am a pirate, two hundred years too late
The cannons don't thunder, there's nothin' to plunder
I'm an over-forty victim of fate
Arriving too late, arriving too late...

8. Adam Ant - Jolly Roger

Not content with being the Dandy Highwayman, Adam Ant takes to the high seas...

7. Thea Gilmore - Pirate Moon

Thea Gilmore songs are like buried treasure on youtube - terribly difficult to dig up. Thank god X marked the spot on this one - it's gorgeous.

6. The Pogues - Turkish Song of the Damned

Because every Pogues song sounds like it's sung by a lairy, drunken sea captain, I figured I'd have no problem including them in this list. Especially as one of their greatest albums is called Rum, Sodomy & The Lash. I was rather surprised then by how long it took me to track down an appropriate tune... but this one saved the day. Read the full story behind it - and its rather bizarre genesis - here.

5. Rickie Lee Jones - Pirates (So Long Lonely Avenue)

A strange and beautiful song in which the pirates are metaphorical and melancholic.

4. Tom Waits - Shiver Me Timbers

In later years, Tom Waits would come to resemble a real life pirate in both vocals and appearance (in fact, only Keith Richards and Shane MacGowan could beat him in a Captain Pugwash Lookalike Contest). Back in 1974, when this was released though... they'd have made him walk the plank as an imposter. Still gorgeous, despite that...

And the fog's liftin'
And the sand's shiftin'
I'm driftin' on out
Ol' Captain Ahab
He ain't got nothin' on me
So come and swallow me, follow me
I'm trav'lin' alone
Blue water's my daughter
'n I'm gonna skip like a stone

3. Lambchop - National 'Talk Like a Pirate' Day

Ah-harrgh, you scurvy landlubbers... part of me would prefer it if Kurt Wagner made up this day... yet it turns out it's an actual phenomenon (September 19th, if you're interested). Which may even be better.

Without your eye patch and your parrot
I've been informed it's National Talk Like A Pirate Day
Perhaps this singing is a refuge
From other equally uncomfortable thoughts

2. Warren Zevon - Mutineer

Warren would have had no problem talking like a pirate... he even begins this song:

Yo ho ho and a bottle of rum
Hoist the mainsail - here I come...

Like much of this amazing songwriter's work, however, he manages to make his playful lyrics heartfelt and affecting. The more I listen to Warren Zevon, the more I want to hear.

1. Cosmo Jarvis - Gay Pirates

A song so good Stephen Fry tweeted it, Cosmo's Gay Pirates tells of the doomed love affair between two pirates who are victimised because of their sexuality. Both hilarious and heartbreaking, it's a real triumph.

And I'm sick of being beaten
And whipped and lashed to death,
I want one night with no gang-rape
But I won't hold my breath.

But it's you my love
You're my land ahoy
Yeah, you're my boy

Those were my favourite pirate songs... but which one blows you down?