Snapshots #462: Songs About Parts Of A House

From the Doors, all around the house... here's some songs you might hear if an estate agent is showing you round.

15. Cromwell flattened them.

English Civil War history lesson required.

The Levellers - This Garden

14. Sweet transvestite.

Frank N Furter himself...

Tim Curry - Paradise Garage

13. I'll give you half a dozen to sweeten the deal, fella.

Six to the Sugar, man.

Sixto Rodriguez - Halfway Up The Stairs

12. Found inside the Eiffel Tower.

Eiffel Tower.

Felt - Don't Die On My Doorstep

The tube of you directed me towards the Samaritans when I tried to find that song.

11. The rooster raced away from Duane and Floyd.

The cock ran from two Eddies.

Eddie Cochran - Sittin' In The Balcony

10. Disrupting the proton laws.

"Proton laws" was an anagram.

Snow Patrol - Crack the Shutters

9. Playing bass in That Irish Band makes him very happy.

Adam Clayton plays bass in That Irish Band. God knows how he manages to stay Merry, working with those other twonks.

Merry Clayton - The Doorbell Rings

8. Milk, sugar, cornflour.

The ingredients of a...

Blancmange - Living On The Ceiling

7. Is that the best that you can do, Faith and Ant?

"The best that you can do" is the subtitle of Arthur's Theme. Faith and Ant are Adams.

Arthur Adams - You've Got The Floor

6. Small erasers.

The Rubettes - Under One Roof

5. Card-carrying and paid up.

The Members - Rat Up A Drainpipe

4. She has a Clown... and keeps in with Mr. Brown (for his money).

Cathy's Clown meets Dennis "Money In My Pocket" Brown.

Cathy Dennis - Too Many Walls

3. Moving Number 10 from London to Manchester might cause this...

Northern Uproar - From A Window

2. Angelic boss is also loaded.

Charlie Rich - Behind Closed Doors

1. JFK commission unmasks German Numero Uno. 

The people investigating JFK's assassination were the Warren Commission. A German Number One might be "Ze von!" (in a really bad German accent, with apologies to Walter).

Indisputably today's best song...

Warren Zevon - Desperados Under The Eaves

Get back in the Snapshots house next Saturday.

Snapshots #270: A Top Ten Suburban Songs

Here's what the internet suggested when I typed "suburban camera" into my search engine.

Slow down. Here are this week's suburban answers...

10. The Offspring?

The Descendents - Suburban Home

Who doesn't want to be stereotyped?

9. Zealots.

The Fanatics - Suburban Love Songs

The Fanatics were Simon Fowler's band prior to Ocean Colour Scene.

8. Sulphuric Children.

The chemical symbol for sulphur is S. So these are the S-Kids.

The Skids - Sweet Suburbia

7. Euphemistic initialism used to express frustration.

FFS!

That's an amalgamation of Franz Ferdinand & Sparks, in case you were unaware.

 FFS - Little Guy From The Suburbs

6. US Quiz Rota found to be all messed up

"US Quiz Rota" was an angram.

Suzi Quatro - Official Suburban Superman

5. Wogan’s entrance room.

That would be a Terry Hall.

Terry Hall - Suburban Cemetery

4. Bassett, between two blokes.

Fred Bassett. Remember him?

Manfred Mann - Semi-Detached, Suburban Mr. James

3. Prisoner remembers the good times inside.

Prisoner reMEMBERS the good times inside.

The Members - The Sound of the Suburbs

2. Where you can buy a Geordie term of endearment, lads.

In the "pet" shop, boys.

Pet Shop Boys - Suburbia

1. What Spider-Man’s Uncle does with his sheets. 

Uncle Ben always folds his sheets. With great bed linen comes great responsibility.

More next Saturday.

Nicky

One of the best compilation CDs I ever bought was the one pictured above: a fantastic collection of punk and new wave hits, not a bad track among them.

One of the most recent CDs I bought was a lucky charity shop find, titled Sounds of the Suburbs, it's a compilation of the Members' finest moments, proving they were more than just one hit wonders.

Over the weekend, I was sad to read of the death of lead Member, Nicky Tesco. It seemed an appropriate time to listen to this one more time...

RIP, Nicky.

 

Saturday Snapshots #75 - The Answers

"It's All Coming Back To Me Now," you'll be able to say to your grandchildren, many years from now... "the day that Saturday Snapshots finally jumped the shark. The day Rol had a picture of Celine Dion at the top of the page..."

Give me a break: you try finding two different pictures of pop stars holding cameras every week. It's not as easy as it looks, you know. (Although I do have a few more in the bag.) Perhaps the day I run out will be the day I finally call it quits. Until then... My Heart Will Go On.

A very closely fought game yesterday, between Lynchie, Chris, Alyson and C in particular. I think Lynchie just got the title. Well done to Charity Chic, Rigid Digit, George and Martin (Come Together... as one... like George Martin) for mopping up the hard ones.


10. Beautiful Persian queen makes Pilgrim's Progress via choo choo.

Vashti was a beautiful Persian queen.

John Bunyan wrote Pilgrim's Progress.

Vashti Bunyan - Train Song

9. Seabirds, get your guns - we must go now!

Guillemots are seabirds.

Annie, Get Your Gun.

Guillemots - Annie, Let's Not Wait

That's a top song, that is.

8. Only knobs allowed in this club... listening to Pleasant Valley Sunday.

Members Only?

The Members - Sound of the Suburbs

"Same old boring Sunday morning"? Oy!

7. Lexicon of French internet + giant killer.

A lexicon is full of words.

French websites end .fr.

David killed a giant.

FR David - Words

(That sounded a lot better in my head than it does in reality. How memory plays tricks on us...)

6. The French New Wave... kind of.

Nouvelle Vague - In A Manner Of Speaking

5. Improv theatre game for jazz geeks... if you've been playing this game a while, you should get this.

An improvised theatre game is known as a Harold.

Jazz is often on the Blue Note label.

"A Melvin" is another name for a geek or nerd.

I put this week's quiz together a few weeks back. It took me ages to work out the clues for this when it came to write out the answers.

Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes - If You Don't Know Me By Now

4. Start your new job with a sharp piercing stab.

Yes, that is Mick. With a comedy "Grizzly Adams" beard. A hipster long before there were hipsters.

Jagger - a sharp, piercing stab.

Mick Jagger - Let's Work

Video of the week ahoy! What were they thinking?

3. Players depart.

Cast - Walk Away

The reverse of #7. A lot better than I remember it being.

2. John Wayne's looking for hearts in the dustbin.

John Wayne was in The Searchers.

The Searchers - Don't Throw Your Love Away

1. What the Beach Boys read... with Julie Christie & Alan Bates.

The Beach Boys read Surfing Magazines.

Julie Christie & Alan Bates were in the movie adaptation of LP Hartley's novel The Go Between.

Because You Loved Me... Saturday Snapshots will be back next week.

My Top Ten Suburban Songs

Let's all move out to the suburbs!


This week's special mention goes to Suburban Kids With Biblical Names.


10. Manfred Mann - Semi-Detached Suburban Mr. James

When Paul Jones left Manfred Mann, Mike d'Abo jumped in to replace him. This was the first single he wrote / sang for the group... the title was originally "...Mr. Jones" until the Manfreds realised that might be seen as a dig at their previous lead man.

Listening to this again for the first time in years, it occurs to me that Damon Albarn might have had it on in the Blur tour bus while he was writing The Great Escape.

9. The Arcade Fire - The Suburbs

I'll admit it, I never really clicked with The Arcade Fire. I feel they're a band I should spend more time with... but there are so many other shiny things out there that keep stealing my attention. Still, I like this one. I think it's about growing up and watching the world fall apart around you. Which we all know too well these days...

So can you understand
Why I want a daughter while I'm still young?
I wanna hold her hand
And show her some beauty
Before this damage is done

8. The Kinks - Shangri-La

Ray Davies quietly mocks his hero Arthur, a man who's worked his way up from the back-to-back with an outside privy to all the mod cons of the suburbs where life is perfect.... isn't it?

And all the houses in the street have got a name
'Cos all the houses in the street they look the same
Same chimney pots, same little cars, same window panes
The neighbors call to tell you things that you should know
They say their lines, they drink their tea, and then they go
They tell your business in another Shangri-la
The gas bills and the water rates, and payments on the car
Too scared to think about how insecure you are
Life ain't so happy in your little Shangri-la

7. Billy Joel - The Great Suburban Showdown

A song about going home to visit your parents when you've left home as a young adult... and being rather judgmental about how their life hasn't changed at all. With added backyard barbecue.

I've been gone for a while, made some changes in my style
And they say you can't go home anymore
Well the streets all look the same, and I'll have to play the game
We'll all sit around in the kitchen chairs
With the TV on with the neighbors there

6. Pulp - Styloroc (Nites of Suburbia)

Jarvis stumbles across a strange and exotic form of life in the suburbs that he's never encountered before... and soon he becomes one of them.

We drank strange brown liquids, 
And our stomachs swelled up like balloons. 
A thousand fake orgasms every night 
behind thick draylon curtains.
They go on and on and on and on. Oh! 
We sank back into long PVC sofas. 
Outside dogs roamed the streets and the roof-tops, plus it would rain. 
But now we've grown so fat we can no longer pass through the door. 
Stay we must, sprouting black hair beneath bry-nylon underwear.

5. The Monkees - Pleasant Valley Sunday

It's hard to believe it now, but the Monkees were a boyband. They were Take That, the Backstreet Boys, *NSYNC and One Direction before any of those kids were even a twinkle in their daddy's winkle. I don't know, maybe in about thirty years there'll be a middle-aged music blogger writing a Top Ten that sneaks one of their classic hits in amongst the Pulps, Arcade Fires and Half Men Half Biscuits.  

Anyway, Pleasant Valley Sunday hardly needs any further introduction. Classic Goffin & King song that will never grow old.

4. The Members - The Sound Of The Suburbs

Pleasant Valley Sunday reinvented for the punk generation by Nicky Tesco and the lads. Glorious stuff.

Youth Club group used to want to be free
Now they want Anarchy
They play too fast, they play out of tune
Practice in the singer's bedroom
Drum's quite good, the bass is too loud
And I… can't hear the words

3. Pet Shop Boys - Suburbia

There's a creepiness to the early Pet Shop Boys records the band were never able to recapture once Neil revealed his true colours as a disco Noel Coward. This feels like a distant cousin to Ghost Town by The Specials... the suburbs gone bad.

I only wanted something else to do but hang around

2.Half Man Half Biscuit - For What Is Chatteris...

Most Half Man Half Biscuit records are about the little frustrations of (sub)urban living (or occasionally, getting lost in the countryside), but this is my absolute favourite. Plus, it's a sweet little love song to boot. Every line's a gem!

Car crime’s low, the gun crime’s lower
The town hall band CD, it’s a grower
You never hear of folk getting knocked on the bonce
Although there was a drive-by shouting once

1. Ben Folds - Rockin' the Suburbs

Ben Folds' storming anthem to middle class angst and first world problems is also a tongue-in-cheek wink at the overwrought suburban seriousness of bands like Korn and Limp Bizkit (and their fans).

Y'all don't know what it's like
Being male, middle-class and white
Y'all don't know what it's like
Being male, middle-class and white
Y'all don't know what it's like
Being male, middle class and white
It gets me real pissed off, it makes me wanna say.............................................
Fuck!
Just like Jon Bon Jovi did
I'm rockin' the suburbs
Except that he was talented
I'm rockin' the suburbs
I take the cheques and face the facts
That some producer with computers fixes all my shitty tracks
These days...

This debut solo single (after jettisoning the Five) proved a huge hit for Ben. Unfortunately, the album was released on the 11th of September 2001... it did OK despite that.




And if that's not enough to get Ben a well-deserved Number One this week... a few years later he recorded an entirely different version of the song for the soundtrack to the DreamWorks animated movie Over The Hedge... WITH WILLIAM FRICKIN' SHATNER GUEST STARRING AS AN ANGRY NEIGHBOUR. What else do you want? Blood?



I have quite a few suburban songs left over in the garage... did I forget your favourite?