I watched the final episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm last week. You may or may not be familiar with the show in which Seinfeld co-creator Larry David plays himself as a miserable old misanthrope constantly butting heads with societal niggles. Like most comedy shows, you’ll either connect with it immediately or wonder what all the fuss is about. Being a miserable old misanthrope myself, I have found Larry a wonderful companion for the show’s duration, and while I don’t always agree with his grievances, I do understand why he gets so worked up about them.
But this isn’t a post about Curb Your Enthusiasm. I wouldn’t argue with anyone who said the show was long past its best and wasn’t as funny or as incisive as it once was. After 12 seasons, Curb had definitely become comfortable, but there’s a lot to be said for comfort TV, and I did so enjoy being invited to share in the ups and downs of Larry’s life… especially when you never knew which celebrity guest star was going to pop up to be offended by him next. Bruce Springsteen appeared three times in the final series… that in itself made my day.
12 series though… I’ve watched this show for quite some time. And I knew that wasn’t a series a year, because Larry took regular breaks, especially during the pandemic. Still, I was shocked when I looked back and discovered the first series ran 24 years ago! Hang on a minute… I’ve been watching this show for 24 years?
And suddenly, I was taken back to the year 2000. Where I was. Who I was. A completely different person. There’s a popular misconception that all the cells in the human body renew themselves every 7 years, and while that’s not 100% true, there is something in it. I was 28 years old when I started watching Curb. I lived in a different house, worked in a different job, had an entirely different social circle. Liked slightly different records, felt different emotions, saw the future… and the past… in an entirely different way. Somewhat ironically, when the show launched in 2000, Larry David was 52. The same age I am now. I’m not sure why I related to him so much as a 28 year old. In the final episode, he proudly announced that he was 76 year olds… and had never learned a lesson in his life. It made me wonder how many I’ve learned… and how 76 year old me will feel in another 24 years. 2000 doesn’t seem that long ago, and time gets faster every year. 2048 is just around the corner…
You must remember this: a kiss is still a kiss. A sigh is still a sigh.
And Saturday Snapshots is still the thing that gets you all up early on a weekend. Or you could arrive late like Lynchie did yesterday and still hoover up some points. I may stop awarding Winner status at this point, because it's largely irrelevant and involves me doing extraneous maths. Thanks for playing, as always.
Let's celebrate the bank holiday weekend with a good argument, as so many couples do.
Here are ten of the best arguing couples on record... although I had plenty more to choose from, so don't be surprised to hear a Volume 2 one day soon...
Way, way back in the year 2000... before many of today's 16 year olds were even born... German musical actress Ute Lemper teamed up with the likes of Scott Walker, Nick Cave, Elvis Costello and the Divine Mr. Hannon for a "pop" album. This was one of the acrimonious highlights...
Neil:
I was there for you.
You were there for me...
And him,
And half of the western world it seems...
Ute:
No, baby, that's not fair,
There were two or three...
Okay.
...At most
But I don't like to boast.
I
first heard this duet as recorded by one of my favourite bands of the
noughties: The Indelicates. In fact, I'd be featuring their version here
if it was on youtube: they really do make it their own. Hunt it down if
you can.
In its youtube absence though, the original
recording by Loretta and Conway is pretty damned cool too. Because looks
ain't everything and money ain't everything...
Dexys' (minus the Midnight Runners of their youth) 2012 album One Day I'm Going To Soar is one of the greatest comeback records in the history of pop... and these two songs are undoubtedly the highlight. It all begins with a passionate fling between Kevin Rowland and new recruit Madeleine Hyland which goes awry when Kev admits he doesn't know how to love her. (Men!) After a bitter row, she chucks him out... which leads directly into the explanations and recriminations of the following track. Too-ray-aye this ain't...
John and Iris take turns listing their faults... but in spite of all that, they're still very much in love. Which is always nice to hear.
John:
She don't like her eggs all runny
She thinks crossin' her legs is funny
She looks down her nose at money
She gets it on like the Easter Bunny
She's my baby, I'm her honey
I'm never gonna let her go
Iris:
He ain't got laid in a month of Sundays
I caught him once and he was sniffin' my undies
He ain't too sharp but he gets things done
Drinks his beer like it's oxygen
He's my baby
And I'm his honey
Never gonna let him go
Space are unfairly remembered as another bunch of Britpop also-rans, but listen to this again and it's a thing of unique beauty that sets them on an entirely different platform from the likes of Cast, Menswear and those two idiot brothers. It's weird, yes, but never too self-consciously quirky. The lyrical detail saves it, along with the genius move of employing Cerys for guest vocals: who else could have sung, "I have never thrown my knickers at you!" with such conviction (not to mention perfectly setting up Tommy Scott's comeback, "And I don't come from Wales")?
Best thing about it? This was actually their biggest chart hit... although we probably remember them more for Me & You Vs. The World or Female of the Species. Seriously, give this one another listen and remember: this song was on radio station A-lists all across the country. That's something which would never happen today...
Paul Heaton has probably written more bickering couple songs than anyone else I can think of (see also You Keep It All In, Your Father & I, Even A Palm Tree, etc. etc.).
The beauty of A Little Time though is that on first hearing it sounds more like a traditional love duet. Heaton wisely chose not to sing this one himself, instead giving the male part to the much less sarky-sounding Dave Hemingway, while original Beautiful South femme fatale Brianna Corrigan could well be singing the Diana Ross part of Endless Love. Until you listen to the lyrics. Or watch the video...
Tom and Crystal love to have a good whinge about the state the other one leaves the house in... makes you think they deserve each other. Things do get a little personal at times though. Highlight for me is when Tom asks Crystal...
Tell me - how long have you been combing your hair with a wrench?
Another forgotten classic from the Britpop era in which Lush's Miki Berenyi trades barbs with Jarvis, celebrating the demise of their "relationship". Methinks they doth protest too much...
Jarvis:
'Cause I've met this girl and she's so good to me
She's really beautiful, fantastic company
Oh, when I'm with her I realise what love can be
'Cause she's fifty times the person you will ever be
Miki:
Good luck, mister, do you think I care?
Since you've been gone the offers have been everywhere
I've got a million guys just lining up for me
I've turned a corner, boy, my life is ecstasy...
Marsa was uncredited on Friedman's biggest hit, yet she plays an essential part. It's Dean's lyrics that make this most like a real couple's argument though. The song's filled with non-sequiturs, rhetorical questions, clumsy inference, misunderstanding, sarcasm and the two of them finishing each other's sentences. You may consider it cheesy 70s MOR (sax break and all), but it's much deeper and smarter than that.
Plus, unlike a lot of the arguments on this list, this one has a happy ending...
1. Otis Redding & Carla Thomas - Tramp
Nobody bickers like Otis & Carla... there's not a wasted line in this classic. Best bicker? Without question...
Carla: Look here. You ain't got no money. Otis: I got everything.
Carla: You can't buy me all those minks and sables and all that stuff I want.
Otis: I can buy you minks, rats, frogs, squirrels, rabbits, ...anything you want, Woman.
Tramp wasn't written as a duet. The original version by Lowell Fulsom is just one guy bragging about what a lover-lover man he is. The beat's been sampled by everybody from Joe Tex to Ice Cube to Prince (on 7). The song's been covered by everyone from Salt 'n' Pepa to ZZ Top to the Steve Miller Band. But no other version comes close to Carla and Otis...
What are the chances of you agreeing with any of those? Bloody zero! You'll just disagree to be awkward. I know you.
Ryan Adams arranges a midnight rendezvous at the Starlite Diner (you just wouldn't get a caff staying open that late in the UK)... but will he be stood up?
An old couple relive their youth in an abandoned luncheonette. Quietly heartbreaking...
They sat together in the empty diner Filled with cracked china Old news was blowing across the filthy floor And the sign on the door read "this way out", that's all it read That's all it said...
Often damned with faint praise of the "poor man's Coldplay" variety, not helped by the fact that the lead singer looks like a 20 year old David Cameron. But if you can put all that aside, this is a fantastic "you can't go home again" song celebrating the band's hometowns of Battle and Bexhill on Sea, near Hastings. It does, of course, steal all its best ideas from Glory Days era Springsteen, but you won't hear me complaining about that...
This girl of my childhood games With kids nearly grown and gone Grown so fast Like the turn of a page We look like our mothers did now When we were those kids' age Nothing lasts for long...
Suzanne's biggest hit, due to the nasty DNA 90s dance-beat remix that took it to the top of the charts. I, naturally, prefer the a capella original... which youtube tells me was used by the developer of the mp3 as his reference track. Making it the first mp3 ever... apparently.If you can believe anything you read on t'internet.
Recorded "live" in a genuine New York Deli (or not), where Dean meets the woman of his dreams at 4 in the morning... but gets interrupted quite a lot by the noisy waitresses.
Hey, Louie - there's a weirdo at table four in the back... He's singing!
1. The Handsome Family - The Snow White Diner
The first Handsome Family track I ever heard (on a free Uncut CD) and still one of my favourites... although they have done many other great records. Creepy Gothic Americana at its finest...
I am eating hash browns in the Snow White Diner Outside cars are honking, flashing lights on the bridge They're pulling a car up from the bottom of the frozen lake
A woman drove her Saturn into the black water Killed herself and her two kids trapped in the backseat She'd lost her job and didn't want her kids to be poor
The diner is noisy, black coffee and sugar Baskets of dinner rolls, outside the crowd is growing Waiting by the drawbridge, hoping to see the dead woman's face...
See, I'm not going to apologise for thinking that Dean Friedman is an under-appreciated genius. And his voice is still so good, even on the tiny stages he plays thirty years after his peak.
The whole world's going home with blue plastic bags,
6 bottles of Stella, Jacobs's Creek and twenty fags And you know there is no shame 'Cus we're are all doing the same, Staying in is the new going out, No one's even coming round, We'll have toy fights in the hall...
Written by Manfred Mann's Mike D'Abo, originally recorded by Chris Farlowe, used as the theme tune of The Office, slaughtered by Kelly Jones... but it's Rod's version I favour. Whatever else you might think of Rod, you can't deny that voice.
I was lucky enough to see James Brown live back in the late 90s. I'm pretty sure he did this... once he eventually arrived on stage. Longest build up to an entrance ever, each member of the band got their own intro song before The Godfather finally appeared. Worth the wait though.
I had high hopes for Wheatus after this song, a cracking self-pitying loser-rock single. They followed it up with - of all things - an Erasure cover... then promptly disappeared off the face of the earth.
Hey I was walking my bag
Through a 20 story non stop snow storm
Pirelli calender girls wrestling in body lotion
My head's swimming with poetry and prose
Excuse me one moment whilst I powder my nose...
No prizes for guessing what was in Lloyd's bag on the final Commotions album.
1. Pixies - Bag Boy
A new entry, in at Number One with a silver bullet. First new Pixies material in some time (minus Kim, sadly) and it's a classic. Download it free from their website.
Cover your breath... polish your teeth.
I was surprised how many great bag songs there were in my collection - could easily have gone another ten. But I thought I'd leave some room for you guys... what's in your bag?
Much is being written about the precariously uncertain fate of HMV, and while I'm not the regular customer I once was (partly due to other outlets, partly due to the lack of choice and other issues I have with our only remaining high street music chain) I would be sorry to see it go. Why, I was in there only the other day (before the news was announced), buying the Jake Bugg CD.
Anyway, in tribute, here's ten songs about shops and shopping...
As I flit from shop window to window
I'm trying to pick up a friendly bargain
But it's not like the adverts all make out
And there's no one to greet you as a friend
Of course, supermarkets will never replace record shops, caring only about the pile-it-high-sell-it-cheap Top 40 and their bottom line. They have as much interest in music as I have in over 60s naked sky-diving.Still, if HMV does go under, perhaps the independent record shops will strike back...?
Now, Moz, that's hardly helpful, is it? Even if the owners of Nipper the Dog are one of the many record companies you've fallen foul of over the years.
As a young man, I used to shop around... just as Smokey suggests. Long, pleasurable Saturday afternoons spent wandering around Leeds, popping into all the record shops (and comic shops!), both chain and indie, looking for a bargain. I imagine a similar afternoon would be finished much more quickly these days...
I've always loved this song, but watching the video makes me love it all the more.
1. The Freshies - I'm In Love With A Girl On The Manchester Virgin Megastore's Checkout Desk
Well, it was the only record I could think of about big chain record shops... even if it does namedrop HMV's former rival.
RIP, Frank Sidebottom.
Those were my shopping songs... which one is your must-buy?
So, the Olympics is over and so are my Olympic Top Tens. If you'd asked me three weeks ago if I'd had enough of the Olympics yet, I'd probably have answered 'yes'. Yet, amazingly, I found myself suckered in, addicted to sports I've never had the remotest interest in before (not football though - I still found that dull). I'm really missing the Games now they're done - there's a hole in my life. I just couldn't get enough...
"Enough" is one of those words: the more you look at it, the weirder it looks. There's not enough time to list all my favourite Not Enough Songs, so Ten will just have to be... enough.
You may have expected to find this at Number One... but although it is the Mode's most well known single, and a great singalong radio hit, it's not one of my favourites. The band have made far better records and this one's just a little over-played compared to the rest of their back catalogue. IMHO.
The ultimate question of unrequited teenage love - "Am I not pretty enough? Why do you see right through me?" If you've never been there, count yourself lucky. Or arrogant and self-deluded.
1. Manic Street Preachers & Nina Persson - Your Love Alone Is Not Enough
One of the Manic's best ever singles, from a point in their career when most bands have given up trying so hard.
