(Or, to give it its full title, as Brian did: I Know Someone Who Knows Someone Who Knows Alan McGee Quite Well.)
7. Coins on the breeze really sting.
I was reading an article the other week about how this record was secretly written by the CIA as a way of further destabalising the Soviet Union prior to the fall of the Berlin Wall. The lead singer of The Scorpions denies this, but then he would, wouldn't he?
I missed an opportunity with this clue. I should have used Evil wino Jonathan is welcomed to the Pleasuredome. ("In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure-dome decree...")
That's how you make a music video. Although, frankly, I'd have watched it if was just Olivia.
2. #6 knighted - amazing!
#6 featured John Wayne: The Duke. Give him a knighthood and he'd become a Sir.
Radio Songs took a break for a few weeks. Those of you who read the last post will probably understand why. I haven't wanted to go trotting down that particularly memory lane for a while now. But time wounds all heels, and there's lots more of this story to tell...
Early 90s then, and I'm back at uni during the daytime, while working in the record library and answering phones for the phone in Sunday night and Wednesday thru Friday (Monday and Tuesday were my busy uni days so another guy did the phones then). There were a couple of other things I did to pile up my hours during this time, and one of them was driving shows on tape.
There was a variety of syndicated radio shows that did the rounds of local radio back in the day, but when I think back now, the only one I can really remember (though I know I drove more than just this) was Rick Dees' Weekly Top 40 Countdown. It was the American chart, a week late, interspersed with classic US oldies, and chat from Mr. Disco Duck himself, Rigdon Osmond Dees III. (Yep, that is apparently his real name.) A quick glance at iffypedia tells me that The Weekly Top 40 Countdown began in 1983 - so it'd been going a decade already by the time I started threading the tape on it - and apparently it's still going today.
The show would come in huge cardboard reel to reel boxes, each reel containing one hour of the show... or about 45 minutes of airtime in three or four chunks of audio. My job would be to start the tape rolling after the hourly news bulletin and a few local station jingles, play the first segment, then stop the tape and play an ad break. And so on. Dees would supply a couple of station specific IDs as part of the syndication deal which I'd play in from time to time so it actually sounded like he was broadcasting from West Yorkshire... and not the other side of the Atlantic. And all this had to be timed perfectly so I could hit the next hourly news bulletin without crashing it...
All of which leads me to a recurring anxiety dream I still have to this day... I might get to that in the next radio post, or possibly the one after. But it's weird how it still wakes me in the small hours with a pounding heart, probably 20 years or so since I last sat behind a live, on-air radio desk...
In which Mick & Keef take (gentle) piss out of their original manager, Andrew Loog Oldham... although this was recorded back in 1964 while they were all still mates. Never officially released, and probably a little NSFW if you do your blog reading in the office.
Originally titled Zanz Kant Danz in direct reference to Fogerty's old boss at Fantasy Records, Saul Zaentz, who (back in the 80s) owned the rights to the Creedence Clearwater Revival back catalogue. When Fogerty had a hit solo single with The Old Man Down The Road, Zaentz claimed it was a rip off of Creedence's Run Through The Jungle... and effectively sued Fogerty for plagiarising himself. He lost, but this was Fogerty's response...
Vanz Kant Dance, but he'll steal your money...
Watch him, or he'll rob you blind
To be fair, it's not Fogerty's finest hour (and the Claymation pig video is awful), but it's a great story, and because it's the 80s: we forgive you.
Allen Klein goes down in history as the music company mogul who managed to piss off both the Beatles and the Stones. You can chase up the history of all that yourself, but both the above songs have been seen as former Beatles having a dig at their former manager. An early version of Beware of Darkness contained the lyric "Beware of ABKCO" and many believe Steel & Glass was Lennon putting the boot in too (although John remained closer to Klein than the other Beatles and refused to confirm the song was about him).
A&R man Clive Davis was the guy who signed Janis Joplin, Donovan, Bruce Springsteen, Billy Joel, Earth, Wind & Fire and Santana (among others) to CBS before founding Arista Records where he brought us Patti Smith, Barry Manilow, Whitney Houston and Alicia Keys. One of his biggest signings at CBS though was Aerosmith, and Steven Tyler thanked him personally by mentioning him in the opening track to their 1979 album Night In The Ruts. It's not the band's best album as they were pretty much imploding at the time due to money issues, drug abuse and relationship problems (guitarist Joe Perry quit the band for five years during it's recording while still owing CBS a bill of $80,000 in room service... that's a lot of bottles from the mini bar).
No Surprize is the best track on an otherwise dodgy album, and it works as a potted history of Aerosmith from the early days...
Nineteen seventy one
We all heard the starters gun
New York is such a pity
But at Max's Kansas City we won
We all shot the shit at the bar
With Johnny O'Toole and his scar
And then old Clive Davis said
I'm surely gonna make us a star
...right up to the horrific realities of being a tragically impoverished rock star in 1979.
Candy store, rock n' roll
Corporation jellyroll
Play the singles, it ain't me It's programmed insanity!
You ASCAP
If BMI
Could ever make a mountain fly
If Japanese can boil teas
Then where the fuck's my royalties?
Hey, Steven: doesn't everybody boil tea? What makes the Japanese so different?
Another unconfirmed one, but most Dylan fans believe this to be a thinly-veiled attack on his Bobness's former manager, Albert Grossman: a man who, in name and appearance (Dylan described him as being like Sydney Greenstreet in The Maltese Falcon) must be the archetypal music business boss.
Written and released posthumously, which is probably why it's a little more respectful than most of the "tributes" on this list, but there's also much to suggest that Anthony H. Wilson was a little different from many of the other bosses mentioned here. The Factory founder is held in high regard by most of the artists he signed and lots of other folk he crossed paths with along the way... which is demonstrated by the video which features contributions from the likes of Iggy Pop, Christopher Eccleston, Bernard Sumner, Shaun Ryder and Rowetta, Mark Radcliffe, Miranda Sawyer, Terry Christian, John Cooper Clark and Steve Coogan (who played Wilson in the 2002 film 24 Hour Party People).
St. Anthony was written by Manchester poet Mike Garry and set to music (based on the tune of New Order's Your Silent Face) by composer Joe Duddell, who's previously worked with New Order, James, Elbow and others. It's a hugely affecting piece of music, a credit to all those involved. For more information (or to download the charity single or EP), click here.
Poor old David Geffen. He had such a tough time being a multi-millionaire music mogul that he could only ever feel free in Paris. Fortunately, Joni Mitchell was there to soothe his furrowed brow with this top tune from Court & Spark.
By the way, I'd love to have given this one to Carly Simon for You're So Vain, but although she has claimed that song is about a composite of three men, she won't confirm that David Geffen was one of them (even though a lot of people suspect he was...along with Mick Jagger & Warren Beatty).
It's an indie top three this week, just like the good old days. Proper indie too, nothing yobby or from the watered down 21st Century!
Stuart Murdoch takes a backseat and lets Stevie Jackson sing lead vocals on this one, a story about the rest of the band flying out to LA to visit the legendary record producer while Murdoch stays home and moons over a girl. (Typical Stuart Murdoch, really: this is the same guy who called this album 'The Boy With The Arab Strap' as a reference to the grumpy Scottish band... and claims to have had no idea what they'd named their band after.)
I heard dinner went well
You liked Chris's jacket
He reminded you of Johnny
Before he went electronic
Interesting that both this and the next song reference The Smiths. That's proper indie right there!
Ah, the Pooh Sticks. Self-aware indie pop not afraid to mercilessly take the piss out of the whole business, where (more than any other profession), it's not what you know: it's who you know. And not only does this late 80s indie classic mention the notoriously grumpy Creation founder... but also this next guy too...
1. The Smiths - Frankly, Mr. Shankly
It's been so long since I featured The Smiths on this blog... you'd almost think I wasn't a fan.
As has been well established, this was Morrissey's ungracious tribute to Rough Trade boss Geoff Travis. He did apparently once write Morrissey a poem... and, well, Moz makes it quite clear here what he thought of that.
And finally, this is one to play to anyone who ever tells you the Smiths were "miserablists".
But sometimes I'd feel more fulfilled Making Christmas cards with the mentally ill I want to live and I want to love I want to catch something that I might be ashamed of!
The Beatles, The Stones, The Smiths, Dylan and Joni Mitchell. Shit, I'm turning into MOJO. Your suggestions are welcome for songs about the managers of less well-known music industry managers. I was surprised I couldn't find any songs about Phil Spector, Joe Meek or Berry Gordy. Perhaps you know differently...
John Fogerty's animosity toward his old record-company boss Saul Zaentz lasted until the latter died in 2014. It all stemmed from Creedence Clearwater Revival's
1967 contract with Fantasy Records, which Fogerty for years wrestled to
get out of. The wounds were still fresh in Fogerty's mind when he
released his comeback LP, 'Centerfield,' in 1985. The album's closing
track, 'Zanz Kant Danz' ("but he'll steal your money," went the
chorus) pissed off Zaentz so much that he sued Fogerty for defamation.
The song's title was later changed to 'Vanz Kant Danz,' but the point
was made and the damage was done.
Read More: Evil Record Label Songs | http://ultimateclassicrock.com/evil-record-label-songs/?trackback=tsmclip
