It can't have escaped your notice that Doctor Who celebrated its 60th anniversary last week, blasting its way back onto screen with an old face and a Disney+ budget. Like most British kids, I grew up with The Doctor, and your first Doctor will always be your favourite. Which means you can't beat Tom Baker in my eyes.
Still, I have a great fondness for most of the other Doctors, including the modern incarnations (although Huddersfield lass Jodie Whittaker was let down during her tenure by terrible scripts). They say we spent large parts of our youth hiding behind the sofa to avoid the show's scarier bits... and I do have vivid memories of being behind that old red leather sofa in our living room on a Saturday night... but I'm pretty sure I was acting out the adventures I'd just seen on screen rather than escaping in terror.
Here then is a special edition of TV On The Radio dedicated to all the Doctors.
Search for songs that include the words "Doctor Who" in that order and you're on a hiding to nothing. Unless you want to hear a load of tunes that have nothing to do with Timelords such as this...
She sent me to the doctor who sent me straight to bed
I had far more luck searching for words that were unique to the Whoniverse. Such as TARDIS (Time and Relative Dimensions in Space, as I'm sure you will recall).
Here's someone who would look right at home in an episode of Doctor Who... Thom Yorke.
I'm stuck in the TARDIS Trapped in hyperspace One minute, snake charming The next in a motorcade
Step outside the TARDIS and you may encounter some of The Doctor's greatest enemies. For reasons explained above, I didn't bother looking for The Master, and only found the odd song that mentioned Cybermen... but the Daleks were all over the place.
Dave Balfe and Alan Gill from The Teardrop Explodes formed the most famous band to be named after the psychotic pepper pots, possibly my favourite science fiction bad guys (the Daleks, not Balfe and Gill).
Despite my difficulties in searching for "Doctor Who" songs, I still found quite a few that mentioned the Timelord by name (or, not actually by name, since Doctor Who isn't actually his name, is it?). Although many of them fall into the category that causes serious musos to gnash their teeth to the gums... comedy or novelty records.
Frazer Hines was a minor Yorkshire celebrity due to his role on Emmerdale Farm in the 70s and 80s (back when my dad used to watch it because they had actual farmyard scenes). Prior to that, Frazer was an early Doctor Who assistant when he recorded this...
Once All About Eve were done, lead singer Julianne Regan formed Mice. Here's a little timely advice for any of you who might be considering running off with a stranger in a blue police box...
He's my blue sonic boy I believed in his watery lies And his half-arsed scheme to rule the world But you know it isn't easy hanging out with the timelords When you're a Dalek and can't even climb up the stairs So when you wake tomorrow, stick a bell in your van
There were lots of artists I discovered during this search who looked like they'd only ever get a gig at Comicon, but these guys deserved a special mention, for enthusiasm, if nothing else...
But there was only one song I could choose to close this post, from the insane genius of Bill Drummond and Jimmy Cauty, The KLF, The Justified Ancients of Mu Mu and The Timelords... with a little help from The Sweet and (whisper it now) Gary Glitter. A Number One smash that Melody Maker described as "pure, unadulterated agony" and "excruciating", while Sounds called it "rancid" and "a record so noxious that a top ten place can be its only destiny". What's not to love?
Yes, I'm using the same picture I did yesterday. Because I'm too lazy to change it, and because 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, in Los Angeles. And even if he's a lazy man - and the Dude was most certainly that. Quite possibly the laziest in Los Angeles County, which would place him high in the runnin' for laziest worldwide. But sometimes there's a man, sometimes, there's a man. Aw. I lost my train of thought here. But... aw, hell. Here's this week's answers...
10. Cat sits on white wine.
Cats sit on mats. As readers of the Oi, Frog! books will know.
The Dumbarton we visit today though is on the west coast of Scotland and it was the birthplace of David Byrne and Wings guitarist Jimmy McCulloch. Apparently Franz Ferdinand once released a remix of their song Take Me Out retitled "David Byrne Was Born In Dumbarton", but I can't find that anywhere to t'interweb.
I couldn't find any other songs that mentioned Dumbarton by name, but I did find this little beauty from Glaswegian indie band (and a band I've actually met and interviewed!), The Supernaturals.
Boghead Park (former home of Dumbarton F.C.) was the oldest football stadium in Scotland when it finally closed down in 2000, having originally been opened in 1879. Here, James McColl of the Supernaturals fondly remembers visiting Boghead as a boy...
Reach out and touch faith - it's your own personal answers to Saturday Snapshots. It was just A Question of Time.
Alyson took the Early Bird trophy this week, ably assisted by Chris, Charity Chic, Rigid Digit and a last minute save, all the way from Dubai (thanks, Jim). C took issue with the Siouxsie & The Banshees photo which turned out to be Siouxsie and a bunch of non-Banshees, for which I apologise... but it was the least recognisable Siouxsie photo I could find on the interweb. She has a pretty iconic look.
Even if you only got one of them right this week, remember... Everything Counts!
My explanations will be brief this week due to an impending visit from Ofsted. (Yes, they know check music blogs too. Not much chance of this one getting Outstanding.)
This week, ten songs dedicated to idiots everywhere. Especially those in positions of power. Because, like a lot of people in the UK right now, I'm angry.
We need Woody Guthrie's guitar more than ever, it seems.
I think I'm going to let the songs do the talking this week...
There's no point for democracy when ignorance is celebrated
Political scientists get the same one vote as some Arkansas inbred
Majority rule don't work in mental institutions
Sometimes the smallest softest voice carries the grand biggest solutions
This is the hour of the idiot
That was a time when the crime could take command
This is the mirth of human brilliance
A wonderful hour of the idiots at hand
8. John Wesley Harding - Idiot's Delight
Power's aphrodisiac, addicts die of thirst
The new El Presidente saw his bubble finally burst
And the king returned from exile, by request to break the curse
He fulfils election promises with temporary cures
And everything's worse than it once was without the same allure
And his stepson is on squad inspection making overtures
It's alright
It's alright
It's alright tonight
Because it's all performed for the idiot's delight
It's all performed for the idiot's delight
Because it's all performed for the idiot's delight
Power's aphrodisiac, addicts die of thirst
The new El Presidente saw his bubble finally burst
And the king returned from exile, by request to break the curse
He fulfils election promises with temporary cures
And everything's worse than it once was without the same allure
http://www.lyricsofsong.com/w/kjmlji
And his stepson is on squad inspection making overtures
It's alright
It's alright
It's alright tonight
Because it's all performed for the idiot's delight
It's all performed for the idiot's delight
Because it's all performed for the idiot's delïght
Power's aphrodisiac, addicts die of thirst
The new El Presidente saw his bubble finally burst
And the king returned from exile, by request to break the curse
He fulfils election promises with temporary cures
And everything's worse than it once was without the same allure
http://www.lyricsofsong.com/w/kjmlji
And his stepson is on squad inspection making overtures
It's alright
It's alright
It's alright tonight
Because it's all performed for the idiot's delight
It's all performed for the idiot's delight
Because it's all performed for the idiot's delïght
Power's aphrodisiac, addicts die of thirst
The new El Presidente saw his bubble finally burst
And the king returned from exile, by request to break the curse
He fulfils election promises with temporary cures
And everything's worse than it once was without the same allure
http://www.lyricsofsong.com/w/kjmlji
And his stepson is on squad inspection making overtures
It's alright
It's alright
It's alright tonight
Because it's all performed for the idiot's delight
It's all performed for the idiot's delight
Because it's all performed for the idiot's delïght
British Lose Right to Claim That Americans Are Dumber
Take it away, Green Day...
Welcome to a new kind of tension.
All across the alienation.
Where everything isn't meant to be okay.
Television dreams of tomorrow.
We're not the ones who're meant to follow.
For that's enough to argue.
If you're in Heaven then you'll forgive me, dear
Because that's what they do up there
If you're in Hell, then what can I say?
You probably deserved it anyway
I guess I'm gonna find out any day
For we'll meet again
And there'll be Hell to pay
It was gravity which pulled us down and destiny which broke us apart
You tamed the lion in my cage but it just wasn’t enough to change my heart
Now everything’s a little upside down, as a matter of fact the wheels have stopped
What’s good is bad, what’s bad is good, you’ll find out when you reach the top
You’re on the bottom
Yes, I chose an Oasis song. It's not completely unheard of. I reckon this is one of their best, perhaps because it owes far more to The Kinks than The Beatles. Plus I like Rhys Ifans in the video... but more on that later.
Here they come, gone 7am
Getting satellite and Sky, getting cable,
Bills and Bens and their mums and their friends
Who just really, really want to be loved,
Uncle Teds and their legendary vests
Helping out around the disabled,
From the flats and the maisonettes
They're reminding us there's things to be done.
Nothing lazy about those lyrics.
See also the gorgeous One Lazy Morning by Brett Anderson, solo (i.e. the rest of the band stayed in bed).
What a bunch of lazy bleeders the Supernaturals were - not only lazy lovers who can't be bothered getting into bed... but when they eventually do, they moan I Wasn't Built To Get Up. They can't even stay awake in their videos.
When it came time to select songs about sloth, Morrissey was obviously going to feature. Take your pick from The Lazy Sunbathers or All The Lazy Dykes... but this one's my favourite: quintessential Mozzer...
Please don't worry There'll be no fuss She was... nobody's nothing
When he awoke The sea was calm And another day passes like a dream
1. The Lemonheads - The Outdoor Type
While the rest of the artists on this Top Ten are bone idle Brits (with the exception of comatose Canadians Moxy Früvous), the laziest man in rock has to be American "Slacker King" Evan Dando. This could well be my favourite Lemonheads song, in which Evan confesses his lethargic credentials...
I can't go away with you on a rock climbing weekend What if something's on TV and it's never shown again? It's just as well I'm not invited, I'm afraid of heights I lied about being the outdoor type
As Martin pointed out, my Top Ten Hot Summer Songs was quite an all-encompassing topic for me, hence why I was barely able to scrape the surface of all the great summer songs in my collection. Here then, in an effort to narrow the field, are ten great songs with "Summertime" in the title...
I've told you before, if you're going to name your band "Girls", don't expect anybody to find you on google... even if you do get Jim Jarmusch to direct your video. (In Iceland. Hardly the most summery of locations, Jim.)
As I already gave Eddie Cochran pride of place in my Top Ten Hot Summer Songs, here's a somewhat rowdier version from the other side of the pond: Live at Leeds, to be precise.
And it's you I need in the summertime
As I turn my white skin red
Two peas from the same pod, yes, we are
Or have I read too much fiction?
Is this how it happens?
1. Fun Boy Three - Summertime
According
to Iffypedia, there are over 25,000 recorded versions of this song,
originally written by Gershwin for the musical Porgy & Bess. I can't
claim to have listened to them all, but I do own fine versions by Sarah
Vaughan, Ella Fitzgerald, Frank Sinatra, Sam Cooke, Janis Joplin, Paul Robeson and Nick Drake (among others).
Fish are jumpin' And the cotton is high Your daddy's rich And your momma's good-looking...
Why choose this early 80s reggae-lite version from Terry Hall and chums out of all those? I think it was Terry's hairdo... and the hay bales, hammock and hi-jinks of the video.
Those were my favourite summertime songs. I know there is one glaring omission, but I'm saving it for another list. (And I'm waiting for the Sabrina fans to come out of the woodwork...)
Turns
out there are dozens of Mount Washingtons in North America - 15 in the
USA alone, plus one in Canada. They'd all have to go some to be as
beautiful as Beth Orton's song though.
Another Welsh mountain, otherwise known as Twmpa (hence "Could this be heaven, would that be the Severn? Twmpa, Twmpa, you’re gonna need a jumper"), inspires one of Nigel Blackwell's many songs about hill-walking and mountain-climbing... with a smattering of innuendo to warm the cockles.
Ever since the chattering classes invaded Hebden Bridge
And priced the likes of me and mine
To the pots of the Pennine Ridge
To South East Wales I was forced to flee
And now I have no job
That’s why tonight I’m sitting on top of Lord Hereford’s Knob
See also Kilimanjaro by the Teardrop Explodes which is a classic album, although the title track wasn't on the original track listing and isn't available to link to anywhere on t'internet.
And now for something even older than The Mountains of Mourne - a truly majestic piece of Classical music, though there's some debate over whether the Russian translation of the title should be 'bare' or 'bald'... or, indeed, whether the version we're all familiar with owes slightly more to Rimsky-Korsakov than Mussorgsky. I don't claim to be an expert.
1. The Supernaturals - Everest
The world's biggest mountain... and one of the best songs the Supernaturals ever recorded, gently mocking the whole "my love is bigger than a mountain" metaphor mentioned earlier.
I bought a goldfish to keep me company In these dark days when you're not here with me I walk round Safeway on my own Look in the freezer cabinet, see my reflection and I'm all alone You dropped me like a waitress drops a tray...
Those were my SPECIFIC mountain songs... remember, Ain't No Mountain High Enough doesn't count.
We Brits don't call them highways... and they're the antithesis of freedom and romance. And yet... there's more songs about motorways than you'd expect. Remember these next time you're stuck in a three hour tailback on the M6...
There are obvious nods to Kraftwerk in the backing track (and no, an Autobahn is not a motorway), but the lyrics take us in a much more bizarre direction, updating a biblical journey to a world of solar-panelled rooftops and crumbling cooling towers... ivy-clad reminders of a long-forgotten power. Metaphors aplenty to keep your mind active when the cones crowd round.
...obviously sounds like it's going to present a more realistic, less romanticized vision of the English motorway system. And apart from the incongruous reference to 'gasoline fumes' (petrol, surely, Ray) you'd struggle to find truer words than these...
Motorway tea is warm and wet, The rain is a pouring and it's four in the morning, And it's all I can get. You've never seen loos like motorway loos, Thousands of people passing through, It's enough to put you off of your motorway food.
OK, so strictly speaking, this isn't about a motorway. It's about taking the A-road, the OK-road, that's the best. Hence, it's about NOT going on the motorway. Which is fine with me...
You may hate the M25. You may have nightmares about the M6. But the motorway that has been the bane of my existence for the last twenty-five years is the M-bloody-62. I truly believe it to be the worst motorway in the country, especially the stretch between Manchester and Leeds.
This would have been a much nicer song had they not named it after Satan's Driveway.
Every time I listen to The Long Blondes now, I get sad they aren't around anymore.
Wipe your eyes darling, it's OK Meet me on the dual carriageway Separated by motorways The A14 and the A1 Separated by motorways Two lonely girls go on the run
With the news that George Lucas has sold Star Wars to Disney, there's a whole new trilogy to look forward (?) to in a few years time... we can but hope they'll be better than the last three.
Still, here's 10 songs you might hear covered by the Cantina band... but be warned, most of these are pretty damned obscure.
The opening track on their debut release begins with the sound effect of a Tie Fighter. The album is called 1977... the year Star Wars was released and Ash were born.
Good old disco: never shy to jump on a bandwagon. The Real Thing had three great singles. This was the third, and least. But I'll let them have a pass because the other two were stone cold classics.
3. The Supernaturals - Star Wars
Sadly unavailable anywhere online, this obscure Supernaturals b-side (from their excellent single I Wasn't Built To Get Up) tells of a young man forced to choose between Star Wars and his girlfriend. Turns out it's no competition...
