As Half Man Half Biscuit reminded us on Friday, yesterday was Record Store Day. And so, to celebrate, rather than taking out a second mortgage (the first one's bad enough), I dug out 15 songs about record companies. They're rarely complementary...
15. Soft focus.
I know, I know, these guys only featured here a couple of weeks back, but I couldn't not include this...
I was up in my mum's attic a few months back and I found a load of my old writing. Novels, TV scripts, comic book scripts... all things I wrote before I owned a PC, so I guess it dates back to the late 80s and early 90s. Everything I've written since getting a computer has been saved on memory sticks and external hard-drives, but back then all I had was a crappy word-processor with a tiny screen that used an early form of floppy discs to save my work. (Prior to that, I wrote on a huge, clunky old typewriter... those really were the glory days.)
I've been scanning these old texts (many of which are not very good at all, though they still mean a lot to me) so that I can keep them digitally - I haven't got room for all this mouldering old paper that's been stuck up in an attic for 30+ years... but I wouldn't want to throw any of it away without preserving it somehow.
This process has reconfirmed for me the fact that writing has always been something I've used for Self Help (therapy!): to help me work out my feelings, deal with life experiences, try to make sense of the big mystery.
Back when I spent hours and days and weeks of my teenage and twenty-something life writing all this fiction, I told myself the goal was to be published (or produced)... the mental health benefits I received by putting my words down on paper were an unwitting bonus. I didn't realise how much writing was helping me, but clearly it was - everything I wrote had my own thoughts, feelings and life experiences as its core (no matter how fantastical other elements of the plot might have been), and the sheer amount of time I spent on it speaks for itself.
Writing can be a self-care method for many; helping to unwind and de-stress.
Writing about difficult situations can help us release our feelings in a healthy way. In a study conducted by psychologist James Pennebaker, researchers encouraged individuals to write about their darkest emotions and thoughts regarding a terrible incident. The findings revealed that individuals who wrote about their encounters had considerably fewer physical problems, such as migraines and gastrointestinal issues than those who did not write at all.
This makes me wonder what might have happened if I hadn't spent so much of my youth writing. Would I have been significantly more depressed? Would in turn that have led to physical symptoms? Or... might I have spent more time with friends, trying to build more of a social life and immerse myself in the tribe? Would I have pinged off on a different tangent altogether?
Creative writing forces you to arrange your ideas and put them into words. This can assist you in putting things into perspective and making better judgments. Writing also assists you in becoming more conscious of your own ideas and emotions.
It's worth pointing out that while I was doing all this writing, I wasn't a complete hermit. I did have friends and a facsimile of a social life - just not as wild/busy/varied as many teens and twenty-somethings enjoy. I even stumbled into a couple of romantic relationships. I fit the writing around all that. But I definitely lived in my head - and on my pages - far more than the average bear.
Some may also use creative writing as a way of connecting with others. Sharing tales and perspectives while also learning from, and supporting one another.
Back when I spent so much of my life writing those stories, they were rarely read by anyone else. Occasionally I'd submit one as part of my English degree (the tutors weren't my biggest fans) and one or two other people might have read something I wrote.
And then there were all the agents, publishers and production companies I collected rejection letters from. But I'm not sure they count - clearly they didn't read my submissions in the correct way, otherwise I'd be talking to you while sitting on a huge pile of cash right now.
(That was a joke, by the way. Even when I was an aspiring writer, I was aware that published writers often don't make a lot of money. That never stopped me, so clearly financial reward wasn't high up my list of aspirations. I just wanted to earn enough that I could keep on writing, and make it my life.)
The exception to the "Nobody reads my writing, but I keep on doing it anyway" rule that I lived by back then were the small press comics I put out. These did have a readership, and a particularly vocal one too. I had about 30, 40 regular readers from all across the country, having made a name for myself in the small pond of amateur comics and used the limited outlets available for self-promotion in the pre-internet days to the best of my abilities.
Many of these readers would provide written feedback - I use the term "fanmail" very loosely, but a few folders of glowing handwritten correspondence was among the treasures I discovered in my mum's attic. I even ran a letters page in my most successful book,The Jock, and this would often run to 5 or 6 pages of tiny-typed feedback and discussion. By contrast, when I returned to making small press comics in the new Millennium, though the internet made it far easier to promote your wares and the print quality was far superior to the grainy black and white photocopies of the 90s, I hardly received any written feedback on my work. I sold more copies, but hardly anybody had anything to say about what they'd read - even though an email would have taken far less effort than posting a handwritten letter... such is the world we live in now.
Back to the University of Bolton for one final word about the mental health benefits of writing...
It can make you feel better about yourself as it allows people to see what's going on within your thoughts. You may even earn praise from friends and family after sharing anything you've produced with them. If you don't share your writing, then writing about yourself and the events in your life provides an artistic outlet to express your thoughts without fear of criticism from others. Writing about yourself allows you to ponder on who you are as a person and how much importance each human being has.
And this is where we have to take a step back, to last week's post, and the week before's. Remember our old friend Tiberius? Remember how worried he was about other people's opinions? Remember how we discussed "externalising his self-worth", how Tiberius received a tiny little feel-good dopamine hit every time someone smiled at him or complimented him on his work? Remember that article from the Harvard Business Review that advised Tiberius to Stop Basing Your Self-Worth on Other People’s Opinions? Well, here's a little more from that...
Externalizing our self-worth, when it works, can yield short-term benefits. We get emotionally and chemically rewarded when we succeed. Our hypothalamus produces dopamine, often referred to as the feel-good neurotransmitter. Our self-esteem gets lifted, leaving us feeling safe, secure, and superior.
But dependency on external validation and social approval has a dark alter ego that reveals itself over time because outsourcing our self-worth undermines the basic human needs of competence, autonomy, and relatedness.
If, as a writer, you live for your readers' responses, that way lies madness. Because what if they don't like what you've written? I was lucky back in my small press comic days, because almost all the letters I received were positive or at least offered constructive criticism. The folk who didn't like my writing, frankly, couldn't be bothered to go to the trouble and expense of mailing me a kicking. Meanwhile, the rejection letters I received from publishers and agents... while every one of them was a heartbreaking kick in the balls... most went out of their way to be bland, neutral, faintly encouraging and inoffensive.
Nowadays, the only writing I have the time, energy or inclination for is this nonsense right here. I still get all the mental health benefits mentioned above, along with the added dopamine hits of a tiny group of discerning readers who occasionally drop me a kind word in the comment's section. But if I was in a small pond when I was self-publishing comics, I'm in a miniscule lagoon right now... though it's a relatively safe and warm lagoon, compared to the vicious, unforgiving ocean of the internet at large. Many people - especially young people - are living their whole lives on the cruel seas of social media, desperate for a bright wave of dopamine, but ever too often pulled down into the murky depths of... well, you get the picture. I extended that metaphor much further than I intended to. Hack writing.
When SHFC returns after its Easter break, we will finally confront THE MENTAL HEALTH TIME-BOMB of Social Media. Be afraid. Be very afraid.
Because my inside is outside My right side's on the left side 'Cause I'm writing to reach you now But I might never reach you Only want to teach you, about you
10. Almost like a lone cuckoo, above its nest, on a rack, surrounded by water, screaming.
OK, McMurphy was the character Jack Nicholson played in One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest... so this guy almost sounds like him.
An island is surrounded by water. If it were on a rack, it would be a long island. The screams would be the sound it made as I stretched it to make this clue work.
38 Special are a Southern rock band formed by Donnie Van Zant, the younger brother of Lynyrd Skynyrd singer Ronnie.
As Martin identified in last week's comments, loads of songs make mention of the Smith & Wesson .38 Special, and though he chose not to mention them "in the spirit of gun control", that didn't stop the rest of you! I was metaphorically blown away by the following fully-loaded suggestions from...
All roads lead back to Nick Lowe. Going with "Me and My .38" by Carlene Carter off of 'Blue Nun' from 1981. This one was co-written and produced by then husband Lowe. She's backed by Lowe's band at the time... Paul Carrack, Martin Belmont, James Eller and Bobby Irwin. Love this album. Tough broad. When she leaves the key under the mat, you better show up or you'll have a double date with her and her .38.
I wish I could find that somewhere online, Brian, because it sounds like a cracker. Sadly, the internet let me down. However, I'll see your Nick Lowe suggestion and raise you this...
I'm not putting that into google translate, but I bet it's mucky.
Back to Martin then, who clearly thinks he's identified a smart way of winning this game: just choose songs by my favourite artists. (Although Lynchie's still smarting that this tactic didn't work for him last week.)
(Yeah, I know that last one would get quickly disqualified if one of you suggested it, but it's still a belter if you like Jeff Lynne shamelessly ripping off the Beatles.)
But, I'm sure it comes with great relief that Douglas saved you all from having to listen to Jon Bon Jovi's boob-inspired lyrics this week by suggesting this cracking story song from his oft-requested Canadian heroes, The Tragically Hip. I have a weakness for story songs, particularly when they involve breaking out of prison.
The SLFs claim to have been betrayed by Rough Trade lies...
We quit our jobs and got all set to fly Your promises had us riding high But it's a dirty rough tough trade we find "Yeah we agreed, but you hadn't signed Sorry, son, gonna have to throw you Our lawyers say we don't even know you" Music is money, kids are no-account fools You trade in us, we get betrayed by you
Meanwhile, Graham Parker remains "the best kept secret in the West" because of his own lacklustre record company...
The geriatric staff think we're freaks They couldn't sell kebabs to the Greeks, the geeks! Inaction speaks, and I've got Mercury poisoning - it's fatal and it don't get better!
From back in the days when record companies handed out free money just for a signature on the dotted line... and some fools tried to take advantage of that.
Nigel Blackwell gently pokes fun at the most indie of record companies and its roster of bizarrely named bands.
I dream of occasional fanzine mentions I’ve been to one too many David Lynch Conventions I play postal chess with a man who doesn’t know me I’ve got a better frown than Tony Iommi And I’ve got a 4AD3DCD A 4AD3DCD A 4AD3DCD And I’m on a foundation course
A warning to all prospective rock stars about the dangers of going downtown and selling your soul to the company man when all they want to do is "sell plastic ware".
The outrageously rebellious image of the Sex Pistols seems now like yobbish posturing steered to success by the machiavellian mind of Malcolm McClaren. How seriously could anyone take the world's most famous punk once he started selling dairy products? At the time though, it was utterly (butterly) believable and the final track on Never Mind The Bollocks... was a giant one-fingered salute to their former record company that helped make Richard Branson more The Man than anyone at EMI.
We write what we live and we live what we write, is that wrong? If you think it is Mr Music Executive why don't you write your own songs? And don't listen to mine, they might run you crazy They might make you dwell on your feelings a moment too long We're making you rich and you're already lazy So just lay on your ass and get richer or write your own songs.
They said we'd be artistically free When we signed that bit of paper They meant let's make a lotta money And worry about it later
A smarter and more credible record company protest song than the Sex Pistols could ever have managed. The Clash were true punks, even when they went reggae.
I wish I'd been aware of this song back when I was writing my Rebel DJ versus Evil Corporate Entertainment Company comic, The Jock. I could have put lyrics like this to excellent use...
This is Joe Public speaking I'm controlled in the body, controlled in the mind
A promising rock 'n' roll career implodes, perhaps because "Their A&R man said 'I don't hear a single"... or perhaps because the temptations of rock star excess prove too much. A young Johnny Depp plays Eddie Rebel in the video, the "rebel without a clue" whose luck turns bad when he turns his back on his manager, Faye Dunaway. Stick around for a cameo from a pre-Friends Matt LeBlanc in the song's closing moments...
1. The Smiths - Paint A Vulgar Picture
You don't get a more caustic assessment of the "sickening greed" of the "sycophantic slags" who work for The Man... although there's a certain irony now hearing Morrissey deride the culture of "Re-issue! Repackage! Repackage! Re-evaluate the songs...", not to mention "Best of! Most of! Slip them into different sleeves!" Still, he's yet to give away a tacky badge. It was a very different business back then though, wasn't it?
See also Frankly, Mr. Shankly which was Moz taking poisonous aim at Geoff Travis, head of Rough Trade, a man who (apparently) wrote some truly awful poetry...
The second stop on my USA tour (following Memphis) brings me to the deep south of Alabama. Never before have I compiled a Top Ten where so many of the songs are so inextricably linked...
The Truckers tell the story of the controversial relationship between the songs at #3 and #1 on this chart, along with a potted history of the deep south itself.
Alabama was also the name of a classic country rock band of the 70s and 80s. Here they're reunited by my favourite contemporary country artist for a tribute song, singing lyrics from one of their biggest records, Mountain Men.
Recalling his youth in northern Michigan (936 miles away from Alabama), Kid Rock shamelessly pilfers our #1 song, Bryan Adams' Summer of '69 and a howling hit by this next gentleman...
Written by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht back in 1927, this has been recorded umpteen times since, most notably by Jim Morrison (above) and David Bowie. I think the Doors version just wins it for me.
Grumpy old northern Neil never had much love for the south, venting his spleen on the segregationist states both here and in Southern Man. Some good did come out of this whole situation though - Neil's angry rants led to the creation of our #1 track. No prizes if you haven't already guessed what that's going to be.
Alabama, Arkansas I do love my ma and pa... Not the way that I do love you
Maybe it's not strictly an Alabama song (Mr. Sharpe and the Zeroes are from L.A.), but that opening lyrics always points me in that direction.
1. Lynyrd Skynyrd - Sweet Home Alabama
Well I hope Neil Young will remember A southern man don't need him around anyhow!
There have been various theories put forth over the years about the politics espoused by the Skyn' in this song. Go listen to #9 for more about that. For me, this is just one of the greatest rock guitar songs ever, a track that always makes me want to "turn it up"...
