Tuesday 2 July 2019

Hot 100 #35


Welcoming us to the number 35 on our countdown is Italian "cinematic funk band" Milano 35. Here they are in action. 

35 proved a tricky number for those of you who are playing along at home, with only 4 of our regular correspondents having anything to offer. Here's a selection of those...

Martin started us out with a lyrical reference which sent him down a scary internet rabbithole of old The Word performances.

Inspiral Carpets - Saturn 5

Laying down the lifeless corpse of President 35
The lady crying by his side is the most beautiful woman alive

I should have included that in My Top Ten JFK Songs.

Lynchie also had a lyrical offering...

Christy Moore - Blackjack County Chains

I was sittin' beside the road in Black Jack County.
Not knowing that the Sheriff paid a bounty,
For men like me that hadn't got a penny to their name.
So he locked my leg to 35 pounds of Black Jack County Chains.

Whereas our Canadian correspondent, Douglas, chose to play it safe this week with suggestions from two of my all-time favourite artists. Surely one of these must be the winner?

Bruce Springsteen - My Hometown

Last night me and Kate we laid in bed
Talking about getting out
Packing up our bags maybe heading south
I'm 35, we got a boy of our own now
Last night I sat him up behind the wheel and said, 
"Son take a good look around...
This is your hometown."

Billy Bragg - Speedway Hero

So fill her up and pick her up
And ride into the breeze,
You're taking all the corners
That were at the 35 degrees.
It's so hard to face up to
It's not in no highway code,
Another speedway hero's coming home.

That one even feels like Billy channeling Bruce, so extra points right there.

However, I decided to go another way this week, and I'll explain why in a moment. First though, the usual trawl through suggestions kicked up by my own hard-drive...

Saint Etienne - 4:35 In The Morning

Spacemen 3 - 2:35

Rodney Crowell - I Want You #35

Carla Bruni - Ballade At Thirty-Five

Onto this week's winner then, as suggested by The Swede (good to have you back) and seconded by Lynchie. Regular readers will know that The Swede suggests a Bob Dylan track most weeks on this feature, and most weeks his suggestions fall on deaf ears. This week he hit on an obvious classic though. Blonde on Blonde, the album this comes from, was the first Dylan album I ever bought, and for a good few years it was the only one I owned. I listened to it a fair bit while trying to get into his Bobness at a young age, and while it didn't quite persuade me to obsessively hunt down the rest of his back catalogue, I fostered a strange affection for it. If I was forced at gunpoint to name a favourite Dylan album, this would be my go-to. Everybody must get stoned.

That said, don't expect it to show up again at number 12. I can easily think of a dozen songs that would come before it.



34 next week. Another tough one. Your help greatly appreciated.


9 comments:

  1. If you own "Blonde on Blonde", you also have to own "Highway 61 Revisited" and "Bringing It All Back Home". Those constitute the holy trinity of Dylan albums.

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  2. For next week, I offer "Up Against The Wall, Redneck Mother" by Ray Wylie Hubbard with the chorus:

    "And it's up against the wall, redneck mother
    Mother who has raised her son so well
    He's 34 and drinkin' in a honky tonk
    Just kickin' hippies' asses and raisin' hell..."

    ReplyDelete
  3. Douglas McLaren2 July 2019 at 14:14

    So, no Billy and no Bruce this week, huh? And I though backing two favourites was a sure bet! Okay I will go a little different this time, and suggest Monsters of Folk with the song Man Named Truth. For anybody that does not know Monsters of Folk, they were a sort of one-off supergroup of Americana folk-rock greats, made up of Conor Oberst and Mike Mogis of Bright Eyes, Jim James (My Morning Jacket) and M. Ward. They take turns songwriting and taking lead vocals, and though I love the album, it is as a result a little uneven...like they haven't fully learned each other's strengths and are in a bit of a tug of war for the reins. But there are some fantastic moments in there, including this song:

    Pain was hunting me down but I gave him the slip
    then I fell in love with identical twins
    They lived 34 summers between the two of them
    I gave one my ego, I gave one my id
    Yeah, I gotta get back to my pretty little twins
    Don't ever buy nothin' from a man named truth
    Don't ever buy nothin' from a man named truth
    I'll tell you right now that it ain't no use
    Don't ever buy nothin' from a man named truth.

    And if that doesn't impress, then I threaten to go back to suggesting Weird Al Yankovic songs like Skipper Dan, who is

    "...doin' 34 shows every day
    And every time it's the same
    Look at those hippos, they're wigglin' their ears
    Just like they've done for the last 50 years."

    Hope no one's going there though...

    ReplyDelete
  4. The Searchers tell how "she's got a pad down on 34th and Vine" in Love Potion No. 9. Great little song.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Quick update - I've only just discovered that it was first recorded by The Clovers in 1959, five years before The Searchers' version.

      Delete
    2. Doh, I was going to pitch this! Great minds, etc...

      Delete
  5. Yeah Spacemen 3, 2:35, forgot about that.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Is that ban on Kate Bush's 50 Words For Snow still in force?
    34 Sorbetdeluge

    (Yes, I'm struggling with this one)

    ReplyDelete
  7. How about I'm Going To Spain by The Fall, which opens with the line "I've sold my car, thrown in my job, I'm 34 years old..."

    Or What The Milkman Saw by Reverend and the Makers, which asks "What's going on at number 34? Kev says there's bodies buried underneath the floor..."

    ReplyDelete

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