Tuesday, 2 March 2021

Conversations With Ben #6: Precious Time


Ben:  This article came up on my Google news feed. I feel it has won the award of most pointless article to ever be farted into existence.

Rol: It's an advert.

I have a Casio digital watch that costs £10. I replace it maybe every 7 years.

My watch broke and I haven't replaced it. I still look at my wrist though. I tell the time by how 
much my hand is shaking.

I don't understand watches.

That's because time is not that important to you.

Ben replies with a tune...


Van The Man? I wouldn't have put him in your cornucopia.

Yet here we are.

I like Van because he's a grumpy old git. I feel a certain kinship. Although he should still wear a mask.

He's a dick, but I like his songs.

Which brings us back to our recurring theme...

Why do Jefferson Airplane start out so incredible then write the most mediocre song of all time?

Well, they were a very different band by the time they released We Built This City

(Many suggested answers to your question can be found here.)

I don't hate it. You had to he there and be 15.

Richard Ashcroft has just covered John Lennon's awful pun-protest song "Freda Peeple". That title sums up everything I hate about Lennon.

I believe Mark E Smith was just doing performance art channelling Lennon.

Is that why he was so thoroughly unpleasant?

That's the joke I was making.

Apologies. Sometimes I have to clarify the subtlety of your wit.

There's not a single interview or video of Lennon where I don't think he's a massive tool. I don't have time for ego.

But Genesis, on the other hand, just aged like a fine single malt.

Don't start with the Collins love.

The Collins love has no beginning and no end. It's is the one true constant.

But Collins is a massive Tory.

Again, not him personally. But that 80s pop. Yes, please.

And his Disney Tarzan soundtrack too.

I suppose that was your childhood. I bet you like Circle of Life too.

I'm very confused by your relationship to the 80s. What year were you born again?

I lived 9 months of the 80s.

Arguably the worst 9 months.

Well, I wasn't truly conscious, so I can't speak to my experience of it.

I wasn't blaming you. When's your birthday again - 15th?

I thought the 15th was yours? I know it's in close proximity to mine.

19th.

21st.

Oh. I thought it was before mine.

First day of spring. Until about 5 years ago when they started saying that the 20th is the first day of spring. That annoyed me.

How can they change that?

The LIBRUL MEEEDEEEEYUH R LYRS.

When they mention Istanbul on the news, Sam sings Istanbul (Not Constantinople). I consider my work done.

That is a good job.

At least Lady Gaga got her dogs back.

Did she? Was the dog walker OK?

He's "forever a hero".

And are the FBI still investigating?

Now Trump is gone, the FBI have time on their hands.

Well, they started an investigation as they believed it may be a retaliation for her singing at the inauguration.

Or just a retaliation for her singing?

Wasn't the dog walker shot? Or did I misread something?

He was shot but will make a full recovery.

That's something.

I'm still trying to work out how you can offer any defence for Another Day In Paradise.

(No reply is forthcoming.)

This, on the other hand is the funniest thing I saw all week...


To be honest, I'd be happy with people who support Ian Brown not being around. I'm sure there's a big crossover with those who wear Stone Island, are football hooligans and knobs.

And we're back to 1989 again...

I'm no clown, I won't back down
I don't need you to tell me what's going down
Down down down
I'm standing alone, I'm watching you all
I'm seeing you sinking
I'm standing alone, you're weighing the gold
I'm watching you sinking
Fool's gold



Monday, 1 March 2021

Positive Songs For Negative Times #43: Nighthawks


If you asked me to name my favourite live album, I'd probably struggle for an answer and then plump for one of the infinite number of Bruce concerts now available to buy... but the truth is, I'm not that big a fan of live albums in general. Even those I like, such as Springsteen On Broadway, I haven't listened to half as much as any of his studio albums.

The one exception - although it's a faux live album... albeit one that was recorded live (in pieces) in front of an audience (just not a real nightclub audience) - is Tom Waits's Nighthawks At The Diner (named after the Edward Hopper painting above). Not only is it my favourite "live album", it's also my favourite Tom Waits album.

 I've been listening to it a lot lately, because the mix of sultry jazz bar crooning and witty pre-song banter is proving a soothing late night stress-buster. A positive album for negative times: I'd recommend it next time sleep refuses to welcome you into her fickle arms. Even the painting is comforting in these cold, isolated times. I'd love to walk into that diner, pull up a seat and chat with the folks in there. Like a scene from a movie... which the pre-Covid past now resembles more and more with each passing day.

  


Sunday, 28 February 2021

Saturday Snapshots #178: A Top Ten Guitar Songs


That wasn't too difficult, was it?

A TOP TEN GUITAR SONGS

(If you wonder why I call these lists A Top Ten... rather than THE Top Ten..., it's because there are some songs I have to leave out to avoid too much artist repetition. Like...

Bruce Springsteen - House Of A Thousand Guitars

or

Magnetic Fields - Acoustic Guitar

 ...for just two examples.)

Anyway, these are the guitar songs I ended up with following an exhaustive selection process...


10. The best ale will really scramble your brain.

"The best ale" unscrambled is...

The Beatles - While My Guitar Gently Weeps 

9. Room for treating dried up grass in mason's house.

A room for treating dried grass would be a Hay-ward. Masons live in a Lodge.

Justin Hayward & John Lodge - Blue Guitar

8. Boston girl meets fortune teller who can't read.

Boston sang about Amanda.

A palm reader without the read would be A Palm-er.

Amanda Palmer - Guitar Hero

7. Godard, Hitchcock, Scorsese... Tarantino?

They're all directors who may or may not be considered auteurs.

The Auteurs - American Guitars 

6. A nobleman, like a Scottish monarch.

A nobleman would be an Earl.

A Scottish Monarch might be a Mc-Queen... just like Steve McQueen.

Steve Earle - Guitar Town

5. I get mixed up in a casual windmill.

"Casual windmill" with an extra I mixed into it leaves you with an anagram for...

Lucinda Williams - Real Live Bleeding Fingers And Broken Guitar Strings

Or you could have had this John Denver cover...

Lucinda Williams - This Old Guitar

4. Dead cockneys.

"Brown bread" is Cockney rhyming slang for dead.

Bread - Guitar Man 

3. German clarinet?

A Gerry reed instrument?

Jerry Reed - Guitar Man

2. Bill or Hal? (The latter, not so much these days.)

William and Harry are both Princes... although Harry is in question at the moment.

Prince - Guitar

(If you need a reminder of what a great guitarist Prince was, click that link.)

1. Boastful goat.


Still as blisteringly exciting as when I first heard it...

"The time that it takes to make a baby
Could be the time it takes to make a cup of tea..."

You old romantic, Bill...


More next week!

Saturday, 27 February 2021

Saturday Snapshots #178


If you feel like you're Bissett on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men... then here's Saturday Snapshots to cheer you up. 

Identify the 10 artists below, then think of the theme that connects their songs, then identify the tunes.

Hopefully you won't have to think too Deep...


10. The best ale will really scramble your brain.

9. Room for treating dried up grass in mason's house.

8. Boston girl meets fortune teller who can't read.

7. Godard, Hitchcock, Scorsese... Tarantino?

6. A nobleman, like a Scottish monarch.

5. I get mixed up in a casual windmill.

4. Dead cockneys.

3. German clarinet?

2. Bill or Hal? (The latter, not so much these days.)

1. Boastful goat.


Class dismissed... until tomorrow morning.


Friday, 26 February 2021

Positive Songs For Negative Times #42: Worry B Gone


It's all right.

Everything's going to be ALL RIGHT.

Because now we have a roadmap out of lockdown.

Steps 4 and 5, where we go back into Lockdown #3, not pictured.

Well, everywhere I look, trouble is all I see
Can't listen to the radio and I hate TV
There's trouble with the air, trouble with the water
People ain't treatin' one another like they oughta
So gimme just one more puff of that Worry B Gone...




Thursday, 25 February 2021

MId-Life Crisis Songs #60: Where There's A Will...

 


There's nothing more guaranteed to make you feel the mid-life dread than when your other half convinces you it's time to get a will.

What do I need a will for? If I die, it all goes to you.

Yes, but what if we both die?

Then it all goes to Sam.

But who's going to look after him till he's an adult?

Er...

And what if all three of us die?

If all three of us die, what do we care where - what little we have - goes after that? It's no use to us.

We have to decide.


Thank god there's a practical one in this house, I guess, who can think about such things. Me, I just go along...


But if this blog suddenly goes quiet next week... can I just ask you all to call a snoopy-nosed detective?


The final stinger?

How much you have to pay a bloody solicitor to write your wills!

After that, we won't have anything left to leave anyway.


Here's a song from that Bahamas album that made it into my Top 20 Albums of 2020. It's about money, and how we spend it, and where that leads us. It's a simple morality tale in 4 minutes ten, and it's very funky.

Yes, we had the house
And we have the car
And paid for it all
On some credit card
Now that ain't right

My second home
Your student loan
And every year I got myself a brand new phone
Can't do without
Don't have the nerve
I tell myself that these are things that I deserve


Wednesday, 24 February 2021

Mid-Life Crisis Songs #59: Letting You Go


Last week, I posted a song by Ingrid Andress, written from the perspective of a daughter who knew that if her new man left her after he'd met her parents, he'd be "breaking more hearts than mine". Alyson commented that the song hit the spot for her, both as a daughter and the mother of a 20-something.

Well, here's another one I think you'll appreciate, Alyson. And maybe a few more of you might too. This one is written from the perspective of a girl's father... but mothers, fathers, sons, daughters... I think it says something to all of us. From the latest Jason Isbell album, which is still ticking over in my car (not that I get to drive much at the moment).

The nurse helped us buckle your seat in the car
And they sent us on our way, I drove home so slow
We had no instructions, the first days were hard
But there's things about babies a woman just knows

Three in the morning
I lay my hand over your heart
Just to know you were safe in your sleep
When you started walking
I fight back the urge to stay right there beside you
And keep you on your feet

Being your daddy comes natural
The roses just know how to grow
It's easy to see that you'll get where you're going
The hard part is letting you go
The hard part is letting you go



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