My p-p-p-pick of the Penguins comes from 1954 when it was originally released as a B-side to a forgotten tune, Hey Señorita. DJs began flipping it and playing the B-side and a million-selling record was born... one that iffypedia informs me, "became the first independent label release to appear on Billboard's national pop charts". Does that mean it was the first ever indie record? The band never had another hit, but a lot of lawyers made a lot of money out of various court cases regarding who actually wrote the song (among other contentious issues).
I, like many children of the 80s, first heard Earth Angel performed by Marvin Berry & The Starlighters (with Marty McFly on guitar) as the dramatic climax of the movie Back To The Future. That's when I fell in love with the tune... although it took me a while to finally hear the original...
I'm not sure he needs it yet, he's still a few years off being a sweaty teenager, but apparently it's the thing. So his mum bought him some Lynx. Because the makers have moved away from the ridiculous notion that if you spray yourself with Lynx, thousands of teenage girls will come chasing after you (presumably with some bleach and a scrubbing brush) and now they're promoting themselves via the notion of sporting prowess - wearing Lynx will make you into a G.O.A.T.
It probably goes without saying that I have a problem with Lynx. Due to "odour-linked memories", I don't get The Lynx Effect... I get The Proust Effect.
This name came about because the author Marcel Proust wrote in his book, Swann’s Way, that the smell of a pastry he dipped in his tea brought on a rush of joy associated with his childhood.
However, due to our storytelling brain, the opposite is also true. I don't know if Marcel Proust ever smelt Lynx deodorant, but if he did, I hope it whisked him back to school changing rooms on a wet Wednesday afternoon, when all the footy lads were raring to go, and young Proust was feeling queasy, intimidated and ready for his weekly hour of humiliation. Because that's what happens to me. One whiff of Lynx and I end up right back here...
Buck Rogers was created in 1929 as a comic strip hero who eventually translated into radio and movie serials. However, he is best remembered as the star of the late 70s TV show Buck Rogers In The 25th Century starring Gil Gerard and Erin Grey. In this show, Buck is a NASA pilot who's thrown 500 years into the future, arriving in a world where everyone wears sexy jump-suits and the robots are really annoying. And I mean, really annoying...
In the "You Learn Something New Everyday" Department: Twiki, the really annoying robot above, was actually voiced by Mel 'Bugs Bunny' Blanc.
Music in the 25th Century will also be particularly annoying...
...so Buck will probably listen to quite a few oldies on whatever kind of listening device 1979 creatives imagined we'd be using in 500 years time... I doubt they predicted Spotify.
Let's start with a band named after characters from a science fiction board game, with a song about making a sandwich...
Been out all night, I needed a bite
I thought I'd put a record on
I reached for the one with the ultra-modern label
And wondered where the light had gone
It had a futuristic cover, lifted straight from Buck Rogers
Next up, someone who's no stranger to name-dropping popular TV shows in his lyrics, the mighty Gil Scott Heron, with a song about Reagan's re-election campaign...
Ah yes, they're off and running again. The campaign trail
This week's raison d'etre obviously comes from Feeder though, a Welsh indie band with just enough welly to keep them out of the landfill, and still be filling medium-sized venues almost 20 years after they formed. This is their biggest hit, and definitely their best song...
When The X-Files landed on TV in 1993, it was like they'd made a show just for me. Monsters, UFOs, conspiracy theories... and two leads with undeniable chemistry and a repressed "Will they / Won't they?" relationship. Yes, the show made a few mis-steps along the way, the big story arcs became more important than the (more entertaining) monster-of-the-week episodes, and the Noughties revival was a damp squib... but Mulder & Scully remain two of my favourite TV characters and I still own all the DVD boxsets even though I can watch it any time I want on Disney+.
The X-Files made a huge impact on popular culture, most memorably with The Barenaked Ladies...
Once you start searching for lyrical references to The X-Files, no one will ever find you again. So I gave up and started looking for Mulder and Scully... but even that proved an impossible task. Sifting through the hundreds of references in the hope of finding gold, I did discover that Golden Earring were still in the go in the 21st Century... which is as unbelievable as anything I ever saw in The X-Files.
When it came to picking today's winner, The Truth was definitely Out There. Of all the many, many songs that mention The X-Files, Cerys is definitely a case for Mulder and Scully (and I do love the way she sings "Scully").
Finally, stepping on the toes of Celebrity Jukebox ever so slightly, I couldn't leave today without mentioning this glorious tribute to X-Files star David Duchovny. As yet, nobody's written an equivalent song about Gillian Anderson... except in my head.
Last week's post on Infamous (real life) Murderers was really only a warm up for this, my Halloween special for 2018. I spent far too many Friday and Saturday nights when I was growing up watching gruesome horror movies about some very unpleasant bad guys. And despite what Mary Whitehouse said, it never did me any harm...
...or did it? Mwuh-ha-ha-ha-haaaa!
Here's ten songs dedicated to the bloodthirsty "heroes" of my youth...
The greatest trick the devil ever played... was getting you to listen to a song by the Bloodhound Gang.
Did you ever read Voltaire's "Candide"? He says live life at Benny Hill freak out speed Not a quote of what he wrote but a paraphrase Make it up as you go, Keyser Soze
The Ramones were evidently fans of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and its gruesome killer Leatherface. Though he doesn't get mentioned by name here, he play a big part in the song. For an actual Leatherface namecheck, check out The Wonder Years - Suburbia.
The Ramones also had a song called Pinhead... long before this dude arrived on the scene.
Patrick Bateman wasn't all bad. He was a big fan of Huey Lewis & The News, for one thing.
By the way, if you've never seen it before, I seriously recommend watching Huey's response to that scene (along with Weird Al Yankovich). No, seriously. You owe it to yourself.
No, I'm not suggesting that the Welsh Wonder is a serial killer on the side, but Cerys certainly accuses Tommy Scott of being a scary psycho...
You're worse than Hannibal Lecter, Charlie Manson, Freddy Krueger
1. The Meteors - Michael Myers
Pure psychobilly from the early 80s, paying tribute to the daddy of all movie murderers... the one who famously wears a William Shatner mask... Michael Myers. Happy Halloween!
Now I'm just going down into the cellar. Don't worry, I'll be right back...
It's been a year since he died and I still haven't quite come to terms with it. I accepted Bowie's death, I knew Leonard wasn't long for this world. George was a shock, but not entirely. Prince though...
Of all the artists we lost last year, Prince was the one I felt the hardest. For about a month after his death, I listened to little else but his back catalogue on repeat. He was one of the biggest superstars of my life. Many of the others had been recording long before I was born, but Prince started making music in my lifetime, created some of the most amazing records I ever heard... and then was taken far too soon. I wanted to honour that again, but since I've already compiled My Top Ten Prince Songs, here's the next best thing...
It did seem in the early 90s like the world might well be changing for the better. When Jesus Jones wrote this, they proclaimed Bob Dylan's dream was coming true...
I saw the decade in, when it seemed The world could change at the blink of an eye And if anything Then there's your Sign o' the Times
Guns don't kill people rappers do, From Bristol Zoo to B&Q, I want to rap, I want to rhyme Heard it in a song now I'm into gun crime, Its a sign of the times like Prince changin his name, Gotta have a shooter to be in the rap game, Like Michael Ryan about to snap, Guns don't kill people its just rap!
This is probably the first time I've featured Missy Elliott here, but I am a fan in small doses. I particularly like this one: always impressed by her ability to rap backwards. Wonder how she does that live?
You know Missy feel supa dupa Prince couldn't get me change my name, papa Kunta Kinte a slave again, no sir Picture black sayin', "Oh, yessa, massa"
Beck's whole Midnite Vultures album was a huge departure from his earlier work and wears its Prince influence proudly. A lot of artists have been influenced by Prince musically, but this song also shows huge lyrical influence. It could be the b-side to Raspberry Beret. Speaking of which...
Eminem, the self-proclaimed "worst thing since Elvis Presley", rarely has a positive word to say about any other artist (except, maybe, Dr. Dre). But while he cheerfully puts the boot into NSYNCH, Limp Bizkit and Moby in this track, he really can't bring himself to say anything bad about Prince, using him instead as a comparison for how long Marshall Mathers spent writing songs before he got his break.
Bill Callahan's epic captures better than anything what made Prince a superstar. He was a perfectionist. He lived for his music, more than just about any other artist we've had in popular music. Not all of that music was perfect, but it was his life. More than food, more than sex, more than anything else... music was what mattered to him.
1. Prince - My Name Is Prince
And he is funky.
Of course, the irony of this song was: very soon after, he stopped calling himself Prince and changed his name to an unpronounceable symbol just to piss Warner Brothers off. We all had to call him TAFKAP for the next eight years. But he was always Prince in our hearts.
Here's the last of my three science lessons... for the time being. I may get the test tubes out again at a later date. If I still have any readers after this one...
Taken from his 1976 debut album, which was before he started using his real name after the Cougar (and long before he dropped the Cougar altogether). I like the way he sings bi-ol-ogeee on this one.
Contains the line: "emasculate me with your biology"... but that's not the only reason you should listen to it. The rest of the lyrics are pretty brilliant too.
It stands for Other People's Minds, apparently. I loved this back in the year of 2000AD. Which is odd, because I never set foot on a skateboard. (Oh, she skips biology to do that. In case you were wondering.)
So when Joe gets caught out for cheating on his girlfriend "with some whore out in Germany", he blames it all on biology. He goes on to give her a very detailed lesson in Biology...
Her reply is classic:
She said, "thanks I'm so relieved What you're saying I can well believe Now I know, I feel no shame About Dave and Tony and Phil and James," I said, "Baby baby this can't be true!" She said, "well what's right for you Has to be Right for me In any case I'm sure you'll see It's nothing to do with our hearts It's nothing to do with our heads It's nothing to do with our homes It's nothing to do with our beds It's just be-I-O-L-O-G-why..."
History, Biology, French... Sam doesn't know much about any of them, and he certainly doesn't claim to be an A student. (Don't even start me on that, Sam, as someone teaching the new GCSE this year... there are no more As: just grades 1-9, which nobody - and I mean NOBODY - understands. Thank you, Michael Gove.)
Still, Sam does know how to make it a Wonderful World. Just play this tune...
Yes, Billy Bragg, at Number 2, again. Last week he shared his qualifications, this week he regrets never taking Biology. I didn't take Biology either, Billy. I hated the teacher. (Or she hated me.) I dropped it after the Third Year...
I wish I'd done Biology For an urge within me wanted to do it then...
Also contains the following gem from brother Barry...
My wife has three great attributes: Intelligence A Swiss Army Knife And charm...
1. The Bloodhound - The Bad Touch
The first track I thought of when I started planning this Top Ten. Makes Girls Aloud sound like Shostakovich.
At heart, approximately 75% of pop songs convey this same message... usually with a little more finesse.
So I had an idea for a series of sporadic posts about specific years. Not songs that were released in that year but songs that directly referred to it. Should keep me busy until at least... oh, say, 2525?
Anyway, I thought I'd start with the year that Eminem, Ben Affleck, Cameron Diaz, Karl Urban, The Rock, Biggie Smalls, Jennifer Garner, Brad Paisley, Idris Elba, Liam Gallagher, Gwyneth Paltrow and Billie Joe Armstrong were born. Oh, and yours truly. A lot of the time these days, I feel very old. But if I'm only as old as those guys... actually, I don't feel too bad about it.
1972 was the year of Watergate, terrorism at the Munich Olympics, and Atari's first video game: Pong. Just in case you're older than me and you remember such things first hand.
Oh, and it was also the year the UK signed The European Communities Act, which allowed us to join the EU the following year... whatever happened to that?
Oh, and James Moyer Franks... or Jimmy Pop, if you prefer... was also born in 1972. Although he's made a career out of acting like he was always born exactly 14 years ago, no matter what it says on his birth certificate or the calendar. As evidence, I submit the fact that this is from an album called Hooray For Boobies. As always, I make no apologies for liking The Bloodhound Gang. They keep me in touch with my inner juvenile delinquent.
One thousand nine hundred and seventy-two: That's the year I got here, when my dear mother's water blew. Not really realizin' the prize that's been begot to her The bona fide lo-fi high-octane philosopher. Genius with a penis, the few, the proud, the me I liked me so much I had to buy the company...
Conclusions you drew, proportions you blew: Lost son of Iggy? False bigger nose than Ziggy? True! Yes my name is Jimmy Pop; no, my pop's name is Dick. Don't admit to kick it slick you thick, derelict critic Put down for missed notes, put up with misquotes. Don't want the whole story? Should have bought the Cliff Notes!
But Jimmy Pop isn't the only one to associate 1972 with Ziggy...
Hey, I remember you back in '72 With your David Bowie hair and your platform shoes You had a part-time job, selling fast food But out on the street you were nobody's fool!
From Ben Folds' 2012 reunion with the other two members of his Five, here we find him remembering an old school friend who he first met in '72 (Ben would have been 6). When he meets him again 24 years later, both their circumstances have changed drastically. It's a meditation on the strange way we connect to people, then lose touch, and sometimes reconnect with very different people years later... told with Folds' typically witty lyrical detail.
A timely illustration of the class and generational divide that should, perhaps, be required listening for anyone blaming the baby boomers for recent ridiculous political decisions in the UK. One of many stand out tracks from the album If You're Feeling Sinister, it begins with Stuart Murdoch reflecting on everything that stops him being close friends with this man of much higher standing... although he soon ends up feeling sorry for him.
Now he is swapping his tent for a sheltered home He doesn't have a family, and he is living alone He remembers all the punks and the hippies too And he remembers Roxy Music in '72 He doesn't understand and he doesn't try He knows there's something missing and he knows it's you and I We're the younger generation, we grew up fast All the others did drugs They're taking it out on us
This week's token contemporary country track (ah, I remember the days when all I wrote about was indie!), although Jake Owen wasn't born till '81 so it appears he's reminiscing about his father's childhood in this song. I do like a good lyrical pun though, and this one starts out with a doozy...
1972 Daddy drove in over, it was sky blue He worked at a record store after school Called it Sympathy for the Vinyl
And that's before we even get to the serious rhyming overdose that is...
We’ll be chillin' like a villain on some Dylan while we’re killin' some booze We’re gonna kick it like the kids did in 1972
Like Born In The USA, this is another Bruce song about coming home from Vietnam and finding not a lot waiting for you.
I come home in '72 You were just a beautiful light In your mama's dark eyes of blue I stood down on the tarmac, I was just a kid Me and the brothers under the bridge
Come Veterans' Day I sat in the stands in my dress blues I held your mother's hand When they passed with the red, white and blue One minute you're right there... and something slips...
Not to be confused with the '83 song Brothers Under The Bridges, a much more defiant and uptempo rocker... which doesn't appear to be set in 1972.
American poet John Berryman (whose real name features in the above title) committed suicide in 1972. Okkervil River's Will Sheff is obviously a Berryman fan - even though he wasn't born until 4 years later. The song takes a confessional and confrontational first person approach similar to Berryman's poetry...
From a bridge on Washington Avenue The year of 1972 Broke my bones and skull And it was memorable It was half a second and I was halfway down Do you think I wanted to turn back around And teach a class Where you kiss the ass that I've exposed to you?
...before segueing seamlessly into Sloop John B. (a traditional folk song from the Bahamas long before Brian Wilson got his hands on it), adding a completely new meaning to "this is the worst trip I've ever been on..." (although, to be fair, Brian probably knows a thing or two about bad trips too).
The longest song on Too-Rye-Aye is the one that points the way forward for Kevin Rowland, away from the sheer pop bombast of Come On Eileen and Jackie Wilson Says to a much more introspective and experimental stream-of-consciousness lyricism. It's also one of the first songs in which he appears to be arguing with himself and reaching no real conclusion, both of which would become recurrent motifs in his work (and still are today).
And I'm on the train from New Street To Euston. I'm going out to Harrow again And I'm trying to get the feeling That I had in 1972. Oh but you're going too fast for me here, I'm saying, wait a minute there, wait a minute there Hold it, stop! Let me get this clear... (That's all there ever is) oh yeah yeah yeah? (That's all there ever was) yes, yes. Ha ha ha. (The same for everyone) Oh yes. Yes. Yes.
If ever there was a word crying out to be shoehorned into a Morrissey song, Maudlin was it. Apparently influenced by Joni Mitchell on this one, Moz remembers his first year as a teenager in miserably hilarious fashion. 7 and a half minutes of maudlin glory from his debut solo album, Viva Hate, recorded 29 years ago.
Don't leave your torch behind A powercut ahead; 1972, you know And so we crept through the park No, I cannot steal a pair of jeans off a clothesline For you But you ... without clothes Oh, I could not keep a straight face Me - without clothes ? Well, a nation turns its back and gags...
1. Josh Rouse - 1972
Josh Rouse was born in 1972 too. Back in 2002, to celebrate his 30th birthday, he wrote this song in tribute to the year of his birth. The album it came from was filled with lush 70s AM radio style pop. Harry Nilsson - the man who was at Number One in the UK Singles Chart on the day I entered this world - would surely approve.
She was feeling 1972 Grooving to a Carole King tune Is it too late, baby? Is it too late?
Was 1972 a good one for you? Or do you just remember it through song...?
I was astounded by how many songs in my record collection are Ballads of... somebody or other. I reckon I could have stretched this to a Top 50 if I'd had the time. These were the best ballads of the bunch...
One day, I might get around to compiling a Top Ten Bonnie & Clyde Songs... amazingly, this 1967 Georgie Fame Number One might not make it to the top of that list.
Friendship is a recurring theme in Frank Turner's work and he writes about it in a very open, honest and emotional way. It seems most of Frank's friends are tortured artists...
Everybody's got themselves a plan, Everybody thinks they'll be the man, including the girls. The musicians who lack the friends to form a band are singer-songwriters, The rest of us are DJs or official club photographers. And tonight I'm playing another Nambucca show, So I'm going through my phonebook, texting everyone I know, And I quite a few I don't, whose numbers found their way into my phone, But they might come along anyway, you never really know.
However, while most of them might never reach their intended destination... they're definitely enjoying the journey.
We're going nowhere slowly, but we're seeing all the sights. And we're definitely going to hell, But we'll have all the best stories to tell.
Or ...Lucy Jordon, as the record was originally released. This week's song about growing old... as I've said previously, I listen to a lot of those these days.
At the age of thirty-seven she realised she'd never Ride through Paris in a sports car with the warm wind in her hair. So she let the phone keep ringing and she sat there softly singing Little nursery rhymes she'd memorised in her daddy's easy chair.
There's a splendid cover version by Marianne Faithfull, but I still prefer Dennis Locorriere's vocals on the original.
I'll let you google Chasey Lain if you're unfamiliar with her ouvre... but perhaps don't do that at work.
Juvenile in the extreme, as all the best Bloodhound Gang records are. If you're easily offended or don't have the mind of a puerile 14 year old boy, skip along to the next song.
One of the first John Lennon solo records, in all but name. George and Ringo were both absent from the session and although Macca filled in for them on bass, drums and piano, and shared the songwriting credit with John as always, he had little else to do with the song's creation.
Denied as much airplay as other Beatles records due to its references to Jesus and crucifixion (Lennon further developing his earlier "more popular than Jesus" comparison) it still made the top spot on the UK charts, although it did prove to be their final Number One, and marked the beginning of the end for the group.
One for the geek vote, this obscure American indie song is a tribute to the DC Comics hero The Flash (soon to star in his own TV show... I hope it's better than Arrow). Gets to the targic heart of the character in a way the comics long since stopped bothering.
It's a credit to 1998 that a creepy, John Barry-esque tribute to the Welsh crooner, a bizarre anti-love song duet with a chorus like this...
You stopped us from killing each other Tom Jones, Tom Jones You'll never know but you saved our lives Tom Jones, Tom Jones I've never thrown my knickers at you And I don't come from Wales
...could make number 4 in the charts. It's been years since I listened to this - blimey, I'd forgotten how good it was.
1. Todd Snider - The Ballad Of The Kingsmen
Todd Snider tells the true story of The Kingsmen, the 60s garage band responsible for the huge one hit wonder 'Louie Louie', a record that ended up being investigated by the FBI for its supposedly obscene (but really just plain unintelligible) lyrics. From there he goes on to wonder whether Marilyn Manson records were really responsible for the Columbine massacre... and why we keep blaming our failings as a society on dumb (yet ultimately harmless) pop songs. Brilliant stuff.
Those were my best ballads... but which one makes you go Aye-yi-yi-yi?
Kid Rock wipes his bottom with Radiohead toilet paper. (See the edited-for-language, sorry, video.) For that reason alone, he squeezes into the Top Ten.
Thanks again to Rob for this one. Actually, SMF doesn't stand for what you think it does. Well, the M does (with an -ing on the end). The S and F stand for Sick and Friends, disrespectfully.
Amazed to find this on youtube... not because of the naughty word, but because Prince hates youtube. The full length video does take about three weeks to get going though.
From
his new album, Pale Green Ghosts, already a contender for the best
record I've heard this year. Besides this, one of the other tracks is
called Ernest Borgnine... WHAT ELSE DO YOU NEED TO KNOW?
Half of the time I think I'm in some movie,
I play the underdog, of course. I wonder who they'll get to play me? Maybe they could dig up Richard Burton's corpse.
Buy this record and... you could be laughing 65% more of the time.
Sadly, the video version replaces all the naughty words with donkey sfx. Thankfully, someone's uploaded a version that doesn't...
Yeah I'm hung like planet Pluto, hard to see with the naked eye
But if I crashed into Uranus I would stick it where the sun don't shine
Cause I'm kind of like Han Solo, always stroking my own wookie
I'm the root of all that's evil, yeah, but you can call me cookie
Martha's heartbreaking tribute to her dad, Loudon Wainwright III is the best thing she ever recorded... Loudon should be proud.
I will not pretend, I will not put on a smile I will not say I'm all right for you When all I wanted was to be good To do everythin' in truth To do everythin' in truth
You may (not) be surprised to learn I could easily have filled another ten... although some of them would have been so loud, they'd have made Twisted Sister sound like Sister Sledge.
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