Snapshots #339: A Top Ten Board Game Songs

We do like a good board game at Top Ten Towers. I know, rock n roll, right?

Here are ten rock n roll board games...

10. Who will be at Lester's party, inside the crowd?

Who will be at Lester's party?

The Beatles - Ticket To Ride

Ticket To Ride is my favourite boardgame. Somewhat ironically, it has been replaced by a game called Wingspan as the favourite of everybody else in the house. "It's only the game Ticket To Ride could have been," they tell me.

Oh, and in case you were wondering, The Beatles are on stage in that picture, playing to a crowd of 18 people, in December 1961.

9. Dancing with German Measles.

Rubella Ballet - Twister

I had C down to get that one. I did however question whether Twister was a boardgame. The web of lies tells me it is, so that's OK.

8. Orbiting Atlanta.

The Georgia Satellites - Battleship Chains

7. Jett joins Juliet Bravo.

Imagine Joan Jett was a a policewoman...

Joan As Policewoman - Game Of Life

6. Grape or Dick?

Moby - Go

5. I'll give them 2:1 odds...

A Certain Ratio - Guess Who

4. Rhett smoked a bong, and it really messed him up.

"Rhett smoked a bong" was an anagram...

Booker T & The MGs - Chinese Checkers

I couldn't find any songs about Draughts.

3. Listen to the music playing in her head. 

That's almost a line from Lady Madonna...

Madonna - Sorry

2. Humpless camels on drugs.

Llamas are camelids without humps.

The High Llamas - Three Point Scrabble

1. Attendant and Richard's lad.

A paige and Dick's son.

Elaine Paige & Barbara Dickson - I Know Him So Well

From the Andrew Lloyd Weber musical, Chess...

A few more I didn't have room for in the games cupboard...

Parquet Courts - College Chess Circuit

Seafood - Boggle

Captain Sensible - There's More Snakes Than Ladders

Ride - Mouse Trap

Ariana Grande & Victoria Monét - Monopoly

We'll play again next Saturday morning...

Hot 100 #18

Only one song by one band named after the number 18 in my record collection... but it's not a bad one at all.

The Eighteenth Day of May - Casey Jones

Welcome back to the Hot 100 as we come of age - backwards - with only 17 more weeks to go before I get to have a lie down. As has become customary in recent weeks, there's a ton of songs to get through... so let's get cracking.

Let's start with Martin...

18... I imagine there must be a bucketful. Can't think of too many off the top of my head though, so will just have to go with:

The Stray Cats - 18 Miles to Memphis 

Art Brut - 18,000 Lira  

So no, I don't expect to be winning again next week...

I dunno - that second one was in serious contention.

Next up is Lynchie...

Kathy Mattea has a decent country song called: "Eighteen Wheels And A Dozen Roses"...

Kathy Mattea - Eighteen Wheels And A Dozen Roses

Like that.

Speaking of 18 wheels, Rigid Digit offered this beauty...

Alabama - Roll On (Eighteen Wheeler)

RD also threw these into the ring...

Everyone needs a bit of hair metal once in a while:

Skid Row - 18 And Life

That's like a Silvikrin commercial.

How about electronica?

Moby -18

A bit of headbanging stuff?

Megadeth - Hangar 18

Pardon?

Over to Jim in Dubai next...

This week I am leading with: 

The Associates - 18 Carat Love Affair 

Brian seconded that. And then added a couple more of his own...

Bubblegum Splash - 18:10 to Yeovil Junction 

You do know my affection for anything on the Subway Organization label.

Yes, indeed, and while we're doing time of day songs...

Bloc Party - Waiting For The 7:18

Brian's other suggestion was one from my own shortlist...

Grandaddy - A.M. 180

Jason Lytle's first great song but nowhere near his last.

Love that how that cheesy intro cuts into the guitars.

Back to Jim, who also offered...

The Cygnet Ring - 18 Daze

I do like that.

18 Wheeler - Stay

Look - Jim found another 18 band!

Assuming... 

Momus - London 1888 

...doesn't qualify but certainly worth a mention.

Funnily enough, I did say 19th Century songs would be allowed Jim, because I had a few of my own...

Frank Black - 1826

The Pine Hill Haints - Spirit of 1812

Sparks - It Ain't 1918

The Handsome Family - Emily Shore - 1819 - 1839

Television - 1880 Or So

That is where The National got their entire at from!

Nick Nicely - Hill Fields (1892)

And that's where Damon Albarn got his from.

One more date - a day rather than a year though.

The Deep Dark Woods - 18th of December

Great video.

Alyson made it through my defences to drop these two...

Bobby Darin - Eighteen Yellow Roses 

Bryan Adams - 18 Til I Die

OK, before we get to this week's head to head, here's a few more from my hard-drive of horror...

5 Seconds Of Summer - 18

Nils Lofgren - 60 Is The New 18

Think that probably featured in week 60. Here's another one from Nils, from back when he was closer to 18...

Grin - 18-faced Lover

Client - Diary of an 18 Year Old Boy

Reverend & The Makers - 18-30

Theaudience - Now That You Are 18

Roy Orbison - Almost Eighteen

Consider that an uncomfortable taster of the next couple of weeks.

And finally, a top track from last year's long-awaited reunion album...

The Hold Steady - Star 18

All of which leaves us with two choices for this week.

In the red corner, here's Charity Chic...

I'm eighteen with a bullet

Got my finger on the trigger, 

I'm gonna pull it

And Lynchie...

Fascinating facts about Pete Wingfield (I bought "18 With A Bullet" in 1975 - fantastically fun lyrics):

He produced Searching for the Young Soul Rebels the first album by Dexys Midnight Runners - and also produced The Proclaimers "Sunshine on Leith".

He's played keyboards for Van Morrison, The Everly Brothers, The Housemartins and many more.

Sadly however, he did play piano for The Alan Parsons Project, but nobody's perfect.


In the blue corner, here's... erm... Lynchie...

...and then there's the great Alice Cooper song: "I'm Eighteen".

And C...

I definitely second FBCB's suggestion of Alice Cooper's 'I'm Eighteen'.
A few years ago Mr SDS did his best Alice Cooper impression at a fancy dress party (it was so hot his eyeliner ran and the great thing was that it didn't matter...) Somewhere out there now there's a priceless photo of Alice, Slash and Ozzy together in a scout hut in Essex.



And this week's winner...?

Well, it's obvious really, isn't it?

Well done, Lynchie.

Next week - 17. Off the top of my head, there can be only one winner. You may seek to persuade me otherwise...

Saturday Snapshots #32 - The Answers

Summertime and the living is easy. Perhaps not as easy as you lot keep proving the answers to Saturday Snapshots to be...

I think Rigid Digit took it again this week. I tried to mix it up a bit by changing the start time. Maybe next week I'll start it at 5am and see who's up then (Brian?). Well done to the rest of you who worked hard on the rest though - the winner isn't always the one who gets up first and nabs the easy ones. The true winners are the ones who work at hard the tougher ones... sometimes discovering answers involving bands you've never heard of (so top marks to Alyson for #6).

I guess I shouldn't be surprised by how many Captain & Tennille fans there are reading this blog. Or maybe just people who once they've seen The Captain... have had many, many sleepless nights as a result.


10. Young Strummer wasn't a pretty boy - and he didn't think much of you either.

Joe must have been an ugly kid?

Ugly Kid Joe - (I Hate) Everything About You

9. Muse over these siblings - their affection spills out.

Matt Bellamy is the lead singer of Muse.

The Bellamy Brothers - Let Your Love Flow

8. Followers of Paul and Jimmy are seemingly zero.

Paul Young and Jimmy Young.

The Young Disciples - Apparently Nothin'

7. She's electric - a faux murder mixes with no mutants.

Hole guitarist goes solo... and sounds better for it.

"a faux murder" is an anagram of her surname... minus the X (for mutants).

Melissa Auf der Maur - Lightning Is My Girl

6. Father John takes Pee Wee's place to date a lady plasterer cum brain surgeon.

Father John = Misty.

Pee Wee went on a Big Adventure.

Misty's Big Adventure - She Fills The Spaces In My Mind

5. Steve Rogers unites with Young, Diamond, Tennant, Hannon, Finn, Armstrong, Gaiman, Kinnock, Patrick-Harris and Sedaka. Again!

Steve Rogers is Captain America.

Those are ten Neils.

If you think that picture's scary... watch the video!

The Captain & Tennille - Do That To Me One More Time

4. A ceramic dick.

Some clues write themselves.

Moby - Porcelain

3. A bunch of hairdressers will murder me this evening.

Cutting Crew - I Just Died In Your Arms Tonight

2. Can you eat a huge apple in 60 seconds at the Regatta, boss?

Don is the mafia boss.

Henley Regetta.

New York is the Big Apple.

Don Henley - New York Minute

(Look, Boys of Summer would have been too easy.)

1. Is this Morrissey's moggy? If so, I'll shoot it.

Cat? Steven's! I'm gonna get me a gun...

Why doesn't this ever get played on the radio anymore? It's much better than Father & Son...




More next week... unless The Captain has come for his revenge.

My Top Ten Running Songs (Volume 1)

Still on an Olympics theme...

...but there were far too many good running songs, so look out for volume 2 to follow shortly.

10. Todd Snider - Beer Run

One medal we could all go for. (And I don't even drink.)

9. Paul McCartney & Wings - Band On The Run

Say what you like about Paul McCartney...

Like, for example, if you want to say "that bit at the end of the Olympics opening ceremony where they wheeled him on to sing 'Hey Jude' for the four millionth time was like that bit at the end of a wedding where the embarrassing grandad gets up to sing tuneless karaoke"...

No, really, it's a free country. We're all entitled to our opinions. I won't be offended.

8. Moby - Run On

I like the episode of How I Met Your Mother with the Moby lookalike. I'm mad at the episode of How I Met Your Mother that stole a joke I'd written for Too Much Sex & Violence #6 and forced me to rewrite the bugger.

7. Carly Simon - Let The River Run

Forget Working Girl, forget the car advert, just enjoy this for what it is.

Or marvel at how eerily Carly resembles her old beau Mick Jagger in the video...

6. Creedence Clearwater Revival - Run Through The Jungle

Do you find them much, these stolen cars?

Sometimes. Wouldn't hold out much hope for the tape deck though.

Or the Creedence.

5. Paul Simon - Can't Run But

4. Dion - Runaround Sue

Here's my story, it's sad but true...

Memorably used in the best episode of Moonlighting ever (and therefore one of the best episodes of Any TV Show Ever), the unforgettable Blonde On Blonde.

3. Kate Bush - Running Up That Hill

Peerless, of course. Although the Kate / Pet Shop Boys / Placebo mash-up Love Comes Running Up That Hill Quickly is worth a listen too.

2. Jarvis Cocker - Running The World

This week's "not for the easily offended" track. Otherwise: essential.

1. Bruce Springsteen - Born To Run

I'll love you with all the madness in my soul...

More running songs to follow... can you guess what'll be included?