Radio Songs #66: Critic's Pass

There were many perks to that old radio job. Beyond all the free CDs and guest-list tickets to see some of my favourite artists at that time... and others who would become my favourite artists in the future... beyond all that, perhaps the biggest perk came when I managed to convince one of the local cinemas to give me a critic's pass.

This glorious piece of plastic entitled me to go see ANY film of my choice, any time, FREE. And even better than that, it got me invited to preview screenings of the latest new releases BEFORE THEY EVEN CAME OUT.

I've always been a huge film fan, so this pass was just as valuable to me as all the free CDs and gigs. And it was on one of these late night critics' previews that I came to see what instantly became my all-time favourite movie.

The showing was around 11.30 on a Wednesday night, but back then I still worked the late show a few times a week so staying up till 2am was the norm. I remember the excitement of going to the cinema as all the regular patrons were going home. I have a picture in my head of the dark night outside and the brightness in the lobby, the empty lobby: no brighter than it would be if I were going to see a film at 9 with everyone else, but somehow more special. They were cleaning up and shutting down, but we were just arriving. The special ones. The chosen few, from radio, TV, the press. It's nice to feel important every now and then, to get something nobody else gets. It was for me back then, anyway. It meant a lot.

And this is where I met my hero... or, to put it another way...

"Sometimes there's a man... I won't say a hero, 'cause, what's a hero? Sometimes, there's a man. And I'm talkin' about the Dude here - the Dude from Los Angeles. Sometimes, there's a man, well, he's the man for his time and place. He fits right in there. And that's the Dude. The Dude, from Los Angeles. And even if he's a lazy man - and the Dude was most certainly that. Quite possibly the laziest in all of Los Angeles County, which would place him high in the runnin' for laziest worldwide. Sometimes there's a man, sometimes, there's a man. Well, I lost my train of thought here. But... aw, hell. I've done introduced it enough."

June #2: Tumbleweeds Ahoy!

So I'm cutting back a little bit as of next week. There are a number of reasons for this, which I will now bore you with. I'll try to put a nice tune at the end of the post to liven things up a bit. Feel free to skip ahead to that now.

Last September, I upped the postings on this blog because I wanted to start writing about the songs I was listening to right now, rather than just the random tunes that were thrown up by my topic of the week. To keep with the blog's Top Ten theme, I decided to do a monthly Top Ten of the songs (new and old) that I was listening to that month. This was all very well until I also decided to kick off a few new series like Kenny Wednesdays / Randy Tuesdays, My Top Ten Songs I Hated When I Was A Kid and My Top ∞ Radio Songs. And suddenly I was writing almost a post a day and struggling to keep up (I don't know how JC and CC do it). Plus, I was finding that ten posts a month just on stuff I was listening to at that moment was proving a bit of a struggle... particularly as money's been pretty tight lately and I've only bought one new CD over the last 6 weeks (which hasn't arrived yet!). The (completely unnecessary) necessity of writing ten such posts a month was also preventing me from writing more of the posts I found myself enjoying (such as the series mentioned above, and some others I've had planned for ages but never found the time for... like The Top Ten Songs I Bought Because I Fancied The Singer, which will plumb new depths of embarrassment if I ever get round to it).

The obvious answer is just to drop the monthly Top Ten and concentrate on the other stuff, right? Except I know that if I do that, as soon as I get a new CD... or hear something on the radio that I haven't heard in years but brings back a particularly set of memories... I'll end up wanting to write about it.

Luckily, I think I've come up with a solution to all of this... but first, I need to take a breather. Summer's here and the time is right. I have a couple of weeks off work coming up, and I don't want to spend all my time sat at a computer screen. (Not when there's DIY to be done!*) So don't be surprised if there's tumbleweed blowing through these parts once July arrives. I'll be back. Eventually.

2. Sons of the Pioneers - Tumbling Tumbleweeds




*I loathe DIY.