You get so used to thinking of Paul Heaton as a hardened cynic - or a crotchety comedian - that you may well forget that he can be an old romantic at times too.
Here's one of my favourite Beautiful South songs. It's about growing old with someone. Remembering the excitement of youth, and still finding a flicker of it in their wrinkly old eyes.
If the wind's blowing in the right direction, it fair brings a tear to my eyes...
Let's take a look at these crows feet, just look
Sitting on the prettiest eyes
Sixty 25th of Decembers
Fifty-nine 4th of Julys
Not through the age or the failure, children
Not through the hate or despise
Take a good look at these crows feet
Sitting on the prettiest eyes
Well, the bus-shelter's always ok... when you're young.
This is Sam's biggest hero. Number 95. Lightning McQueen. The perfect start to this week's Hot 100 Countdown. #95 was a much tougher nut to crack than #96... but thanks for having a go.
Chris set the ball rolling with The Ramones - Durango 95. And let's face it, those guys will always be in with a chance. The song's named after another car too... this one:
Nice as that is though, it's an instrumental and it's only 55 seconds long, so hardly the Ramones at their most memorable.
But then came Alyson (who's currently in the lead in this quiz, if anybody's counting) with her most amazing suggestion yet. Digging back into the hidden treasures of her record collection, she reveals one of her favourite tracks of the 80s... prepare yourself to be rocked!
Much respect to Alyson: she knows how to play this game. But she doesn't get any points this week, I'm afraid. My actual choice is far less nasty...
There were three songs in my collection that referred to this famous American highway. And they're all winners... even if none of them is W.A.S.P.
But in the end, it had to be the Fountains of Wayne, taking a 9 hour drive just to see you...
Next week: #94. And if I'm to avoid using a year, I might have to drive really fast to find a song that only references the number 94 in its lyrics. Unless you have a better suggestion that I can pretend was mine all along.
Try as I might to ignore him in the hope he might go away, Trump is the gift that keeps on giving.
I'm sure you've heard his latest brainwave. The solution to all these American school shootings (8 this year alone!) is to give the teachers guns.
Well, speaking as a teacher, I have to say... this is his best idea yet. Uh-huh. Can't seen any problems with that.
Like, say, if I get some really annoying sixteen year old in my class who just will not stop flicking through facebook or snapchatting his pals on his mobile... and I've asked him a thousand times to put it away... and all I get is lip... and I've tried everything I can to get him to pay attention to the lesson... it's not like I'm ever going to crack and say:
Yep. The answer to the gun problem in America just has to be more guns. What could possibly go wrong with that?
Let me tell you about the worst class I have this year. Three hours, from 9am till 12, every Monday morning, and not one of them wants to be there. I mean, sometimes... sometimes... it's like...
The silicon chip inside my head
Gets switched to overload...
(With apologies to Jez, for co-opting the theme of his regular Monday morning posts.)
Because one can never have too many sporadic series that fizzle out and then crop up again when you least expect them, I present: Yesterday's Next Big Things. Bands that those-in-the-know tipped to be huge... who then promptly fizzled away into nothing. Because, as Elvis sang...
You better speak up now, it won't mean a thing later
Yesterday's news is tomorrow's fish and chip paper
I thought I'd start with Spector, a band with the dubious rock 'n' roll chops to name themselves after a musical genius... and murdering psychopath. Well, it's one better than Mansun.
Back in 2012, the Grauniad described Spector as "somewhere between Roxy Music and the Strokes, The Killers and Kanye West, Pulp and Frank Sinatra". Come on, muso-critics: why not chuck Jesus Christ, Buddah and Shirley Bassey in there while you're at it?
I quite liked the band's first album, although they doomed themselves by calling it 'Enjoy It While It Lasts', because after "storming" into the UK album chart at Number 11, they promptly disappeared into semi-obscurity. The follow-up arrived with little fanfare in 2015... so little fanfare that writing this post is the first I'd heard of it. They're still in the go, apparently, but so far have yet to scratch their way into the pop consciousness the way the artists mentioned above did. Still, I like to think there's still time.
Anyway, because it'd Friday... have this. Don't listen too closely to the lyrics... they might also be seen as prophesying a fast fade out.
I think I should start reserving one place on every Top 10 for Iggy, even for his late 80s output which the cool kids will tell you is not all that good. If the song doesn't do it for you, take a look at this...
Anyone seen the movie Atomic Blonde? It's basically "What if Debbie Harry was James Bond?" They really should have found room for this in the soundtrack...
Although I'm young I got a job to do
Hid the microfilm in the lining of my shoe
Call it a business trip
Got to hide inside my trench coat and be clever
I got my papers and a cyanide pill
My Polaroid's a taser in disguise
There's a base in the hills
And the wheat fields looks like Kansas in November
Owes quite a lot to Daydream, a 1969 Belgian hit by The Wallace Collection (which in turn lifted its melody from Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake) that also inspired I Monster's Daydream In Blue.
Listen to the bassline in this. Guess who played it. Only bloody Elvis!
Of course, it took me many years of therapy to get over the Shreddies version. I can smile about it now, but at the time it was terrible. Because of that, I still believe there's a line in the original about not liking toast and jam. (There isn't.)
You see... I dunno... I dunno how you could possibly listen to this and not think it's one of the greatest pop songs ever recorded. I mean, I'm sure you'll tell me otherwise and I'm a square for loving it, but I don't mind. It's hip to be square!
Sometimes you just press random on the cloud and the perfect song comes up to put a shine on the end of a shitty day. This came on on Monday night, Patterson Hood at his best. Cynical, world-weary, yet not giving up...
And my good friend Paul was 83
When he told me that, "To love is to feel pain"
I thought about that a lot back then
I think about that again and again...
I'm a sucker for songs where the singer just mutters the verses at you, only bothering to sing the actual chorus. Some people might call it lazy; I call it honest.
Believe it or not, this is a love song. A lot more honest than most of the love songs you hear on the radio.
Remember, it ain't too late to take a deep breath
And throw yourself into it with everything you got
It's great to be alive...
Or maybe it's just me. (I'm starting to think that should be my sign off line on this blog.)
Swiss Adam suggested the Primal Scream cover... pretty trippy... I always like it when the Scream go mental like this.
Nobody went for the other two versions in my record collection: Garland Jeffreys or The Inspiral Carpets, but both are worth the odd spin. (That organ solo must have been irresistible to Clint Boon!)
Once you start digging around on youtube, you can find all manner of treats, including Aretha, Iggy... even Bruce. But for me, it goes back to my first love. The version I first heard. The version I bought on 7" inch single back in 1990. Congrats to Alyson and Rigid Digit for guessing right this week.
Take it away, Hugh...
95's going to be a bit tougher to guess, I reckon. Any takers?
These guys are The Bottle Rockets, a band I came across on a free sampler compilation from Bloodshot Records that Charity Chic pointed me in the direction of. You can find it here.
You know when you're a kid and the older generation tell you to enjoy those endless days of youth that seen to last forever, because all too soon your time will speed up and you won't know where it's all gone? This one seems appropriate for today...
Tuesday means the weekends almost here.
Wednesday, Thursday, Friday disappear.
Well Saturday means Sunday's almost in the rearview mirror.
