I thought I'd hate that, given how much I hate most dance music from that era. But I actually had quite a fond recollection, hearing it again after all these years. It's a lot more old skool than I remember.
There was another One D... band I could have chosen to illustrate the final edition in the Hot 100 Countdown... fortunately, Swiss Adam saved me from having to go there when he suggested One Dove.
I've been dreading this week since I started this countdown, way way back in January 2018. (Yes, I've been at this for more than two years.)
Partly because I knew there would be thousands of potential ONE songs.
Partly because I knew it'd be impossible to find them amidst all the BlutONES and UndertONES songs, and all the songs about bones and phones; everyone, anyone and no one; money and baloney.
I didn't dread it because I wondered what the winner would be though. I've known that since January 2018.
Before you dismiss it completely, let's not forget that it was written by Nik Kershaw, and came from a movie in which Roger Daltrey played Chezzer's dad.
And, while we're on the subject of Ones & Only... and Only Ones, for that matter... I may as well re-direct you back to this, from way back in 2013...
George will be disappointed to see that Huey Lewis only got to #2 in that countdown. And he was beaten by The Charlatans, for Pete's sake... what was I thinking?
I think it's fair to say I haven't heard that since 1982. However, I was 10 in 1982, and I seem to recall being quite a fan. If you'd asked me, I'd have said this actually won Eurovision that year, but it didn't. It was beaten by Nicole. Still, neither of them were in the same league as the 1981 winners. Witness my nascent sexual awakening at 1 minute 32 seconds on that video.
You may have noticed I'm holding off on the lists this week, folks. There's a reason for that. Over to C...
Blimey Rol, incredible stuff. This must be like a full-time job - perhaps you should charge us for your services to blogging? I'm not even going to add anything, happy just to see what comes up.
The truth is, C, last week nearly broke me. And the prospect of copying and pasting all the one suggestions... and then finding links for the bloody things... I just couldn't take it!
And then Lynchie said this...
Rol - I think you should turn this series into a book.
I would ask who'd read it... but I guess you guys have answered that question over the past two and a half years. For which, I will be eternally grateful... but not so grateful that I could face the colossal workload of this final post.
And then, after whittling his shortlist down to 600, The Swede came to my rescue...
Here's what's left from my hard-drives. Sorry there are so many - for gawd's sake don't post them all!
Do you know what, Swede? That's the best advice I've been given in all my blogging career.
What I'm going to do instead is choose ONE song from each contributor... beyond the ones suggested above.
If anybody cares to see the full list of suggestions, you can do so here.
(Part of me thinks I should have instituted a filtration policy such as this weeks ago.)
Finally, as seems only fitting, here's my Number One contributor... at least in terms of the number of suggestions he's submitted during the lifetime of this series... The Swede.
Just pitching the one this week, mostly because it must surely be the winner...
How right you are, Martin.
(Special mention to Lynchie who guessed the original version, a worthy runner-up.)
As I said at the start, I knew this song would be the winner of the final week of my Hot 100 even before I published the first post. It is, quite simply, perfect...
Which brings us to the end of this feature.
I sometimes wondered if I'd ever reach the end, but I'm glad I did. Chalk it up as another of life's little accomplishments... and thank you all again for playing along. It wouldn't have been half as much fun... and I definitely wouldn't have made it this far... without your contributions.
Final word goes to The Swede...
A thought occurred whilst mulling... I trust you'll be doing a final entry the week after next for zeroes?
Now I don't like to be one to disappoint, Swede, but I just can't face that right now. (Neither can I face "Half Songs" or "Quarter Songs" or anything else, for that matter. If I never see another number again, it'll be too soon.)
However - that's not to say I won't welcome your contributions. If anyone wants to compile a Top Ten Zero Songs and submit it for Guest Post Thursday, I will be happy to let you have the space.
I have got an idea for a feature to replace this one, and I'll be kicking that off in a couple of weeks' time. I've been itching to get to it for at least a year now... and it will require your suggestions (though I'm hoping it won't lead to quite so many as the last few weeks of the Hot 100 has). I hope you'll join me and play along...
I know a lot of people found the joke of the Ben Folds Five - that there were only three of them - to be rather smug, but they're still my favourite band with a Five in their name... yes, I like them even more than 5ive.
Sad to say, every one of those can be found in my hard-drive (except Five Hand Reel, I'm afraid). That's what I was doing while the rest of the male population were out drinking beer, watching football and meeting girls.
"But what about the Five songs?" I heard nobody cry.
I think you can probably work out for yourself why I'm not allowing that one. Not just because it already featured here in Week 55, but because if I started allowing every mention of a 5 as part of a bigger number, not only would that contravene the Tom Robinson Rule, it would also mean revisiting every song we featured in Week #15, #25, #35, #45, all the 50s, etc. etc. etc. My brain just melted at the very prospect.
Oh damnation - Just realised that the Tom Waits song is 55 so we've probably done that one. And suppose Manfred Mann's "5-4-3-2-1" is no use. *sigh*
That's more like it. Although there's something rather disturbing about the character described therein... and it probably contravenes all kinds of size-ist PC rules these days.
I wrote about bands with 5 in their title a while back when I published my 101st post - as has been pointed out around here before (by George I think) the binary number 101 equates to the decimal number 5 so the 101ers could be a contender.
I don't understand binary because I'm not a robot. These guys seem to understand it though...
My personal favourite is this one although it won't qualify I'm sure - George was at his best here and it made for a memorable performance shared many times in the aftermath of his death.
Les Georges Leningrand - George 5 (First time i heard this song it was on quite loud at home, came on a Rough Trade CD, i had to turn it down as i was worried i would scare the neighbours. It is one of the strangest songs i have ever heard but i love it, took a few listens though).
It was looking like Rigid Digit was definitely going for this week's booby prize... until he unearthed this little gem. An absolute cracker. I liked it so much, I wrote a short story with the same title.
Flagrant abuse of the rules there, RD. Watch out, Charity Chic will start comparing you to Dominic Cummings if you're not careful. Speak of the devil (CC, not DC, thankfully), here he is again...
Or what of "Five Foot Two, Eyes of Blue (Has Anybody Seen My Gal?)", which since its penning in 1914 just about everyone has covered, but for the sake of argument here let's suggest Dean Martin's version as well as Guy Lombardo's. Not sure which of those two version my dad had in mind as he went about the house singing it throughout my childhood...
Sadly, I didn't have time to listen to or comment on any of The Swede's suggestions this week, because it's already 8.30 on Monday evening and I've not had my tea yet. I'm sure they were all lovely. I'm also not going to spend too long scraping my own hard drive this week. But here's a few...
However, much as I love that, I'm going to have to plump for the one suggested by C and Swiss Adam this week, mainly because it was the first one I thought of. Yes, it's a cover version of a track mentioned earlier. Or, more accurately, it's two cover versions in one, since it segues effortlessly into Petula Clark's I Know A Place about halfway through... and that's one of the reasons I love it.
As cover versions go there, it manages that rare trick of being better than the original. I think it may well be one of the most exciting songs I've ever heard (I know, I'm delirious from lack of food, humour me).
OK... who's ready for a little four-play?
(Apologies for any typos this week. I had no time to proofread!)
10cc were my obvious choice for the band to illustrate our final week in double figures on the countdown, although as Jim in Dubai pointed out, I could also have had Ten City, Tenpole Tudor, Ten Years After... or, for that matter, Ten Sharp, Ten Benson, The Ten Fours or the Ten Bob Millionaires.
And my search engine also suggested The Pretenders, Yo La Tengo, Morten Harket, Frightened Rabbit, Suicidal Tendencies, Sharon Van Etten and Tennessee Ernie Ford, among others. All of which made searching for Ten songs rather difficult, since there was no way of editing out songs that included the words Listen, Pretend, Tension, Beaten, Tender... or even Extended. And there were rather a lot of songs with "Extended version" in my library.
So I'm very impressed you all came up with as many great suggestions as you did. So many, in fact, I'm going to keep the waffle to a minimum (again... we'll see how well that goes) and just plough through them, starting with The Swede...
I tell you what, all these songs about The Ten Commandments makes me think back to the originals, carved into stone, and carried down from Mount Sinai itself by the one and only...
...which, given the name of this blog, is a pretty good place to stop. Although The Swede did have one other suggestion, which he caveated: I feel I may be pushing my luck now!
Hmm. We'll come back to that.
Over to George, who only had one for us this week, but it was a big 'un...
Smut. Just pure smut. Or is it? Here's Douglas McLaren...
I have to say I was hesitating to suggest Aerosmith's "Big Ten Inch Record" because of the puerile suggestiveness of the lyrics, until after digging a little, I came across the following quote, said about a different Aerosmith jingle: "Actually, there's very little innuendo here, it's just pure smut. But Steven Tyler is such a rock star caricature, it's hard to be offended by it." (A Certain Blogger, June 23, 2017)
As always, you go above and beyond with your research, Douglas. Thank you.
Over to Swiss Adam, who had quite a few from my library. I'll let you work out which.
Fair play to Swiss Adam there, because the ones I didn't have in my collection, I now want in my collection. (With the possible exception of Sabres of Paradise, sorry.)
Alyson, who tonight, Matthew, will be Ben Elton, adds...
Can't remember what you think of UB40 but One In Ten made a big impact on me back in the day and I still have the vinyl copy. After this crisis it might have to be renamed One In Five, but that's me just being pessimistic again. It'll all be fine (she says wearing a rictus smile).
For the record, One In Ten is probably my favourite UB40 song... I even featured it in Saturday Snapshots a couple of weeks back.
You'll have to excuse me, CC, but this post is long enough with me re-running last week's links as well... besides, you're not going to top Engelbert. I'd quit while you're ahead. Although your Engelbert suggestion did lead me to dig out this...
A lot of songs with 10 in the title but most of the ones I'm finding are not even familiar to me so going to stick with what might be your most likely pick. Although C says she doesn't like it, I think you do appreciate Paul Heaton's lyrics so Perfect 10 by Beautiful South would be a possibility.
Y'know, I used to love that song, but it has started to grate a little in recent years. Perhaps because it sounds like a template for every song Paul Heaton & Jacqui Abbott record these days. This is better...
He even supplied the link, just in case I didn't know what he was talking about. See, I'm beginning to think you're not taking this series seriously, George.
Back to Dubai, where Jim had dug up the following...
After all those, I don't know about you, but I need a lie down in a darkened room. I doubt that anyone gives two figs for my suggestions this week (if you ever do). Still, I feel duty bound to list them So...
Way, way back in the dim and distant mists of the past when this post started, The Swede made a final suggestion which he somehow thought might be "pushing his luck now". Do you remember that? Of course you don't, you've slept since then.
Anyway, The Swede's final suggestion was a song set on 10th Avenue in New York City.
Come on guys, you've been reading this blog long enough. Was this week's winner really that big a mystery? You know my weaknesses...
This one's for Clarence.
When the change was made uptown
And the Big Man joined the band
Nine next. Hopefully there won't be as many nine songs as there were ten. But just in case... I might start writing that post now. Chip in whenever you feel like it...
Mumble mumble mumble... an offer you can't refuse.... mumble mumble mumble... answers to this week's Saturday Snapshots.... mumble mumble mumble... The Horror!
I can honestly say I never wanted to be Ian Brown, but watching that video now... especially in the current climate... I do get a pang of middle-aged regret. Even though he actually does bugger all in the video, he's doesn't even sing, just ponces about on the stage. But that was the life, eh?
2. Dispute between Mark and partner: only one can stay.
Marks... & Sparks declare... This town ain't big enough for the both of us!
That photo was a bit misleading, I guess, because we only ever think of Sparks as being two people.
For many years, mainly because of Russel Mael's singing voice, but also because of Ron's imposing glare, I thought Sparks were European. German or Belgian or something. I still can't get my head round the fact that they were from California.
1. Unranked flamingos get Rocky.
"Unranked flamingos" is another anagram. But you could up with a non-anagram clue for these guys. Go on.
Top youtube comment for this track:
"I played this song so loud my neighbors called the cops. My neighbors got arrested."
I was genuinely surprised by how many elephants I found in my record collection. So many great songs featuring playful pachyderms, I couldn't even find room for 'When I See An Elephant Fly'...
Special mentions to Cage The Elephant, The White Stripes (classic album) and to Elephant Elephant by Evelyn Evelyn which, much as I love Amanda Palmer, is a bit too quirky even for this blog...
After two classic albums and a well-regarded debut in three consecutive years, the Rats took a year off and let the quality slip on their fourth, 1981's rather muddled Mondo Bongo. It was the beginning of the end for a once-great group, and the second single, Elephant's Graveyard, ably demonstrates why. It's not a bad song - but neither is it I Don't Like Mondays or Rat Trap. The ridiculous B-movie is an object lesson in record company excess ripping the soul from a band as it pours on the cash.
Some debate recently over on Charity Chic's blog when he had the temerity to throw a bit of Vashti Bunyan on the playlist. A bit too hippy-dippy, twee-diddly-dee for some, but I always liked this one myself.
Bad Seed Mick Harvey also did a song called Pink Elephants as the original title track of his excellent album of Serge Gainsbourg covers. Can't find a link for that though.
Down through the heavens Choke in the cotton clouds Arctic sheets and fields of wheat I can't stop coming down Your shrunken head Looking down on me above Send me home like an elephant stone To smash my dream of love
Who says the drugs didn't work?
Apparently, the Roses are currently in the studio recording their first new material in 20+ years. That should be interesting...
From
1970, so pretty damned late in Bo's career; this is interesting because
it takes the familiar Diddley guitar sound (which, let's face it, had a
pretty big hand in the creation of rock 'n' roll), then wraps it in a
kind of Steppenwolfy organ of the day. The lyrics tell of how Bo
actually created the elephant... which, as we've just established, isn't
too far off the truth.
Lesser spotted hit from the man who sang Honey, the song Tony Blackburn used to dedicate to his wife Tessa while their divorce was going through (cruelly parodied years later by Smashie & Nicey). When I was putting the longlist together for this post, I didn't think this track stood a chance. Then I listened to it again. Just call me an old romantic...
Well, the monkey forgot you The hippo forgot you And so did the kangaroo But me and the elephant, We'll never forget you...
On
first hearing, this is a song about a kid wanting to go see the
elephants at a travelling show. The commentators on youtube claim that
it's also a metaphor for a young soldier going off to face battle in the
Civil War. By the end of the song you start to hear more hints of that
as Pete and Johnny are "dressed up in their navy blue". "Seeing the
elephant" is an American expression for growing up and realising the
world's a bit of a shitty place, really.
A lot of fuss was made about Tame Impala off the back of this single: understandably as it's a classic slice of fuzzy glam that owes more than a little to the Doctor Who theme tune. Couldn't get into the album though. I'm coming around to the idea that I'm getting too old for a lot of this stuff now...
You may think you've never heard this, but if you're over a certain age (I dunno, 29?), chances are you'll know it very well. It was written for the movie Hatari, which I've never seen, but I always loved the tune.
I've been looking for a way to get some Jason Isbell on this blog for a few weeks now as his latest album, Something More Than Free, has been a firm favourite in my car since I bought it a couple of months back. Typically, when I do get the chance, it's a track from his previous album, Southeastern, that fits the bill. But as an example of why he's making serious waves in Americana at the moment, this'll do fine... a heartbreaking story about a guy who falls for a woman with cancer. A sensitive subject, but Jason pulls it off with class.
But I'd sing her classic country songs and she'd get high and sing along She don't have a voice to sing with now We burn these joints in effigy and cry about what we used to be, And try to ignore the elephant somehow, somehow
1. R.E.M. - The Great Beyond
In which Michael Stipe pushes an elephant up the stairs to give REM their biggest UK hit. Taken from Man On The Moon, the biopic of Andy Kaufman, and one of the very few Jim Carrey films I can bare to watch (see also Eternal Sunshine & The Truman Show). What's it got to do with elephants? Why is Stipey pushing one up the stairs? As with all R.E.M. lyricism you'd be better off looking for answers from the great beyond...
