Guest Post Monday: Top Ten Zero Songs

Unable to cope with a Zero edition of the Hot 100 myself, I put the idea out to tender.

First to jump at the opportunity was Charity Chic, who spend a large part of his working week compiling the excellent Top Ten below. He didn't supply a Zero band though, so I chose Remy Zero, who once recorded the theme tune to young-Superman-based TV show Smallville.

Remy Zero - Save Me

I'm running this Guest Post today - rather than on Thursday - because it leads it nicely into the final edition of the Hot 100 tomorrow. Join me then for the full countdown.

In the meantime, take it away, Charity Chic...

Top 10 - Zero Songs

By way of appreciation for Rol’s epic Hot 100 series, I give you a Top 10 of Zero Songs...

10 - The BoomtownRats - Wind Chill Factor (Minus Zero)

Taken from “the difficult third album “ 1979’s The Fine Art of Surfacing, it pre-dates Band Aid, meaning that St Bob was slightly less annoying than he later became.

(Actually, I love that album. - Rol.)

9 - TV 21 - This isZero

TV21 were a post punk band from Edinburgh. Named after a Gerry Anderson comic. Another impressive piece of trivia is that guitarist Ally Palmer is responsible for  curating the Scottish football magazine Nutmeg. I suspect Rol will be aware of the first trivia reference but totally oblivious to the second.

(How right you are. - Rol.)

8 - Bob Dylan - LoveMinus Zero/No Limit

One of the lesser known songs off his 1965 album Bringing it All Back Home.

Described as a hallucinatory allegiance, a poetic turn that exposes the paradoxes of love 

As you would expect, swiftly name checked by The Swede.

7 - Sonny Boy Williamson II - Nine Below Zero

Yes, there were two. The original was John Lee Curtis with number two who is featured here being Alex Miller or Aleck Ford. All very confusing.

(Yeah, you lost me. I'm going to ask George to explain that sentence to me. - Rol.)

Nine Below Zero is also the name of an English Blues band who formed in 1977 and who I saw play on a couple of occasions at Strathclyde Students Union.

6- Isobel Campbell -Below Zero

A lovely song from the album There Is No Other, the first solo album for 14 years from the former Belle and Sebastian chanteuse and Mark Lanegan collaborator. A welcome return.

5 - Yeah Yeah Yeahs -Zero

The opening track from It’s Blitz the third album by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs from 2010.

It was also the first single from the album.

4 - Jill Jackson -Back to Zero

The title track from the 2011 debut solo album by Paisley lass and former Speedway frontwoman Jill Jackson, an artist who I know that Rol has a bit of a soft spot for.

(Indeed. - Rol.)

3 - Public Enemy  - She Watches Channel Zero ?!

A splendid racket and a splendid diatribe by Public Enemy from their seminal album It takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back. As topical now as it was on its release in 1988.

In the words of Chuck D...

I don't think I can handle

She goes channel to channel

Cold lookin' for that hero

She watch channel zero

2 - Joan Armatrading  - Down to Zero

A seriously underrated artist . A track from her eponymous 3rd album from 1976 which also contains the brilliant Love and Affection. The compilation album Track Record is an ideal introduction to her work.

1 - Elvis Costello -Less Than Zero 

No shocks, no surprises. None of the others come close.

I suspect that from the get go most of you would have had this down as the number one

The 1977 debut single from the debut album My Aim is True which introduced the world to the prodigious talent that is Elvis Costello.

Thanks for taking up the baton, CC. You get no argument from me on any of those, especially not the worthy (and only!) Number One.

Of course, that's not to stop anyone else coming up with a second list of Zero Songs, if they think they've got 'em. The doors are always open...

My Top Ten x3 Songs

Not a lot of time today: the boss is driving me to an early grave. And as the boss is a Maths teacher, let's multiply that by three...

Ten song titles to the power of three...


10. The Pierces - Kill! Kill! Kill!

Some days, this seems like a very enticing prospect...

9. Heartless Bastards - Low Low Low

Don't let them get you down.

8. Skunk Anansie - Sad Sad Sad

What did I just say?

7. Genesis - Tonight Tonight Tonight

As if we weren't feeling bad enough!

6. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs - No No No

Double marks!

5. Chic - Dance Dance Dance

Yowsah! Yowsah! Yowsah!

Dancing obviously isn't going to cheer me up today.

However, if Chic doesn't get your toes twitching, you may prefer to dance to this... The Casualeers - Dance Dance Dance

4. Johnny Cash - Cry! Cry! Cry!

Yeah, it's getting that way, Johnny.

3. Abba - Money Money Money

And that, of course, is why we keep putting up with it.

2. Julian Cope - Try Try Try

No choice, Julian.

1. Housemartins - Joy Joy Joy

I was looking for a job and then I found a job, and heaven knows...

...but maybe one day I'll find one that makes me feel like this instead.



And as today is the first day of the month, I'll close with a good luck wish for all of us...

Rabbit

Rabbit

Rabbit

Any threesomes in your collection?

Hot 100 #52

This week's image was an obvious choice, and even came up as a song suggestion from Brian...

The B-52s - 52 Girls

Effie
Madge and Mabel
Biddie, see them on the beach
Or in New
York City, Tina Louise
And there's Hazel and Mavis

But this wasn't the only mention of the B-52 bomber I found in my library. We could also have...

Bobby Gibson & The Voyagers - B-52

Saint Etienne - 52 Pilot

David Lee Roth - Skycraper

Float like a buttuerfly
Acrobatic
Sting like a B-52
Dramatic
And the radar locks on you
No static

The Monochrome Set - Apocalypso

I'm wrapped in silver foil
My blood is on the boil
B-52s flutter coyly

Or... my own personal favourite, natch...

Bruce Springsteen - Growin' Up

...a song where the B-52 button on a jukebox allows Bruce to bomb them with the blues.

A few other lyrical 52s that you suggested include:

The Cure - So What (C)

Cake icing and decorating set
Special offer
Only 3 pound 30
Save 1 pound 52 on recommended retail price

(No prizes for guessing why Robert Smith required such a product. Presumably it's what he used to apply his make-up.)

The Divine Comedy - Festive Road (Rigid Digit)

...which gets top marks for being a song about 80s kids' TV show Mr. Benn. Another hero of my childhood.

Dave Edmunds - I Hear You Knocking

I told you way back in 52
That I would never go with you

C wondered who did the original of that. RD replied that it was Smiley Lewis... and that if you listen carefully to the instrumental break, Dave gives a shout out to him, along with Huey 'Piano' Smith (who played piano on the original version), Fats Domino (who also covered it) and Chuck Berry (who doesn't appear to have recorded it at all, but maybe he played it live?).

Smiley Lewis - I Hear You Knocking

Rigid Digit also suggested this belter...

The Buggles - Video Killed The Radio Star

I heard you on the wireless back in '52...

RD then offered the controversial opinion that the cover versions by Ben Folds Five and Bruce Woolley & The Camera Club were both better than Trevor Horn's original. I'm not sure I agree with that - there's something about the original that just sends a shiver down my spine (in a good way) although they're both fine covers. I'd add the version by Presidents of the United States of America to the list of cracking covers.

Other songs I found that referenced 1952 included...

Roger Miller - South

She was born in '52, she finished in a Mississippi school

M. Ward - Beautiful Car

It was a baby blue fifty-two Roadstar
It was a beautiful car

The Swede offered one of his go-to artists...

Robyn Hitchcock - 52 Stations

(I'm going to see Robyn play Huddersfield Library on a Sunday afternoon soon. ROCK 'N' ROLL! Wonder if he'll play that then?)

Meanwhile, I found a few more lurking in the back of my hard-drive...

Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Area 52

Fish - Brother 52

There are, of course, 52 weeks in a year, so I thought I might find loads of references to that. However, the only ones that leapt out at me were these...

Julia Fordham - Downhill Sunday

52 weekends

52 to go
Sliding from heaven
To the flames below

The Undertones - I Don't Know

I got a postcard from my Majorca
She's now in love with a hotel worker
Holiday extended 52 weeks a year
I wish that I never tried to hurt her

There are also 52 cards in a pack... which obviously led me to this "classic" of my misspent youth...

Wink Martindale - Deck Of Cards

...which I'll play for Lynchie, because I know it's one of his favourites.

And friends, the story is true.
I know, I was that soldier.

All of which leads us to one of Lynchie's other suggestions... which is my runner-up this week...

Billy Joel - 52nd Street

(With a quick mention for Van Morrison - St. Dominic's Preview, which also takes a stroll on that particular road.)

However, I have to agree with both Lynchie and Rigid Digit that there was one very clear winner this week. It was the song that introduced me to this particular artist and established him in my mind as both a lyricist and guitar player of great note...

Said James, "In my opinion, there's nothing in this world
Beats a '52 Vincent and a Redheaded girl.
Now Nortons and Indians and Greavses won't do.
Oh, they don't have a Soul like a Vincent '52

If that doesn't break your heart by the end of the song, then you've got granite in your chest...



51 next week... anyone got anything that can challenge The Swede's obvious suggestion?

Saturday Snapshots #48 - The Answers

Don't Ask Me Why Saturday Snapshots has become the most clicked-on post on this blog. Probably because there's much less of me wittering on than on all the other posts and far more top tunes.

This week there was a photo-finish between Lynchie & Rigid Digit, both on 3 points, both typing the words "Joe Walsh" at 8:58 on the dot, but RD took the crown by a nose. Nailbiting stuff, though Charity Chic had to drop by and identify the song in question later.

Anyway, here are this week's answers... Would I Lie To You?


10. Motown records go twang, dude.

Motown was Detroit.

Records spin on a turntable.

Rubber bands go twang.

Dudes are men.

The Detroit Spinners - Rubberband Man

9. Listening to Louise's old band in the early hours of 11.12.06.

Louise was in Eternal.

The early hours would be 3am.

11/12/06 are the numbers corresponding to letters K/L/F in the alphabet.

Took a while to get the song, but C identified it first.

KLF - 3am Eternal


8. What The Beatles did after She Loves You to show off their genetic male dominance.

After She Loves You, The Beatles sang Yeah Yeah Yeah.

Y is the male chromosome.

Dominance is control.

The Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Y Control

7. As easy as Burt Bacharach.

As easy as ABC.

Burt Bacharach wrote (a different song called) The Look of Love.

Top Ten cheesy 80s videos of all time? Go!

ABC - The Look of Love

6. Butch Cassidy feels more than a few raindrops on his head... probably the result of changing wind patterns.

Butch Cassidy was Paul Newman.

More than a few raindrops would be a Thunderclap.

Changing wind patterns would be Something In The Air.

(I'm glad you guys worked that one out because it's a couple of weeks since I wrote that clue and I couldn't remember who it was!)

Thunderclap Newman - Something In The Air

5. One particular smooch on a religious street of blues.

Religion is faith.

Hill Street Blues.

Well done, Chris.

I wish Americans would learn to pronounce "centrifugal" properly.

Faith Hill - This Kiss 

4. Not a bad innings for a Jamaican cricketer who likes his coffee.

"Not a bad innings" is what people say when someone's had a good life.

Courtney Walsh was a Jamaican cricketer.

Coffee is "a cup of Joe". (Though I appreciated Lynchie's attempt at getting to Rocky Mountain Way via Blue Mountain Coffee.)

Joe Walsh - Life's Been Good

3. Blimey, Gordon! Reykjavik is a now a matriarchy.

"Gordon Bennet!" is an expression which means, "Blimey!"

Reykjavik is in Iceland.

A matriarchy... that's your mum, that is.

Hometown heroes for Rigid Digit! Lost Britpop classic...

Bennet - Mum Has Gone To Iceland

2. Jesus and Harrison Ford try for a close encounter.

Jesus and Harrison Ford were both carpenters.

A close encounter may be the result of trying to get in touch with beings from outer space.

The Carpenters - Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft

(How long till I can use Klaatu here now?)

1. I know this place like half a big cat (or car).

Half a jaguar is a jag.

I know this place like the back of my hand.

Amazed it took till 9:45 to get this one. I was about to comment on that yesterday morning when CC saved me the trouble...



There Must Be An Angel Playing With My Heart, because Saturday Snapshots will be back next week.

My Top Ten Tongue Songs

 

Mind if I slip you the tongue... or ten?


10. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Black Tongue

 Karen O believes in gender equality when it comes to insults...

Boy, you just a stupid bitch,
And girl, you just a no good dick

Not to be confused with Black Tongue by Mastodon which makes Karen's lyrics sound like a Hallmark card... or Silver Tongue by Zulu Winter, who (like many bands) steal their best video ideas from David Lynch and the Coens.

9. Civil Wars - Tip Of My Tongue

Just delicious. Wish they hadn't split up.

8. Mary Gauthier - Slip of the Tongue

Mary regrets getting caught up in the moment and saying something she didn't quite mean...

When I said, "I love you"
It was a slip of the tongue
Love is more than a feeling
It's a way of living everyday
It's the hardest thing I ever gave away

7. PJ Harvey - This Wicked Tongue

So my favourite PJ Harvey album is now 15 years old. Where does the time go?

6. Frank Turner - Hold Your Tongue

Tender acoustic heartache from the rock-punk rebel, with a bitter aftertaste...

Hold your goddamn tongue
You forget yourself.
How could I be the one
If you're wrapped round someone else?

5. REM - Tongue

Don't remember this being released as a single - but Monster had so many great tracks. The rule with Michael Stipe lyrics is that I don't even try to tell you what they're about. Just go with the organtastic groove.

4. Jack White - Trash Tongue Talker

In which Jack White auditions for a guest spot on Jerry Springer. He can talk that trash with the best of them (and Karen O).

Oh well, your mama was a bastard
Had your plastered face all over the scene
You got hassled by your daddy
Always pushing, trying to make you come clean

Apparently the video was directed by Gary Oldman... but as it's a live performance, I guess he didn't have to do much more than show up and tell Jack to get on with it.

3. My Life Story - Sunday Tongue

One of the great lost bands of Britpop, and this was only a b-side, so I was extra pleased to find it on youtube. I wish Britpop was remembered more for bands in the literate/glam Pulp/Suede vein, like MLS, rather than the poshboy pretenders and northern neanderthals...    

2. Talking Heads - Sugar on My Tongue

David Byrne cops off with his neighbour and she performs various acts of a metaphorically culinary nature that get him so excited he asks his friends round to watch.

See also Speaking In Tongues by The Arcade Fire... also with David Byrne (though he doesn't get all that much to do.)

1. Jenny Lewis - Acid Tongue

The divine Ms. Lewis finds herself faced with a sleazy chat-up line as this song begins - from a shoe repairman at that!

I went to a cobbler
To fix a hole in my shoe
He took one look at my face and said
"I can fix that hole in you."

Luckily, she's more than capable of dealing with this creepy cordwainer and goes on to deliver another classic story song about dropping acid in Dixie and meeting a man with soft hands (unlike, presumably, the cobbler) to soothe her pain.

To be lonely is a habit
Like smoking or taking drugs
And I've quit them both
But man, was it rough

So... which one makes you stick your tongue out like Gene Simmons?

My Top Ten Decapitation Songs

"Orf with their 'eads!" as the Queen of Hearts would have it...


10. They Might Be Giants - Till My Head Falls Off

Classic TMBG. If you don't like it, you might need a check-up from the neck-up.

9. Maxïmo Park - The Night I Lost My Head

Why did we have to meet on the night I lost my head?

A decent little tune from MP's debut album... also good for those of you who are still learning to count.

8. Angelica - Bring Back Her Head

Lost 90s bitter indie-pop classic from the band that would become The Lovely Eggs.

Take out the carving knife and cut
Cut
Cut off her head.

7. Morrissey - Margaret On The Guillotine

Mozzer's subtle-as-ever anti-Thatcher drone, briefly resurrected last year when its central question was finally answered.

And people like you make me feel so old inside...

6. Elvis Costello - Tear Off Your Own Head (It's a Doll Revolution)

A single from possibly the last truly great Costello album - When I Was Cruel - though I do keep trying to find the time to give his later offerings a reappraisal. It's tough, because he was one of my favourite songwriters throughout the 90s, but his insistence on paring down the lyrical barbs in favour of a purer, more universal kind of songwriting following this album left me largely cold. Doll Revolution still carries plenty of the infamous Costello spite though... and was covered later by The Bangles in an attempt to get back to their own rock 'n' roll basics.

5. The Magnetic Fields - Chicken With Its Head Cut Off

From the magnificent 69 Love Songs, the only truly essential triple album in my record collection, this is Stephin Merritt at his camp and catty best... this guy knows how to extend a metaphor till it crackles!

Well my heart's runnin' round like a chicken with it's head cut off
All around the barn yard falling in and out of love
Poor thing's blind as a bat
Gettin' up, fallin' down, gettin' up
Who'd fall in love with a chicken with its head cut off?

It ain't pretty!

4. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Heads Will Roll

Probably my favourite Yeah Yeah Yeahs song - Karen O makes a perfect Queen of Hearts. Having a hard time believing it's already five years old though.

3. Frightened Rabbit - Heads Roll Off

I'll dedicate this one to my old pal JC, The Vinyl Villain, who came back from a terrible tragedy last year when his original blog (years of work) was merciless destroyed by the Blog Police. Many bloggers would have called it a day after that, but JC came back fighting with a new TVV - still one of the best blogs on the internet.(And he was kind enough to give me a plug the other day, so I thought I'd return the favour.)

Over the years, JC has introduced me to many fine records and bands - Frightened Rabbit are one of his very best recommendations. And this song's kind of apt as a tribute, as it's all about not giving up.

When my blood stops,
Someone else's will not.
When my head rolls off,
Someone else's will turn.
And while I'm alive, I'll make tiny changes to earth.

Here's to you, JC... I'm sure you'll be horrified by my #1.

2. Warren Zevon - Roland, The Headless Thompson Gunner

I've had this one as an earworm a lot lately, a stand-out track from Zevon's outstanding Excitable Boy album. It's the grimly hilarious story of a Norwegian mercenary targeted by the CIA who becomes a vengeful ghost with a submachine gun that just keeps shooting.

Tragically, this was the last song Zevon ever performed live, on the David Letterman show in America, shortly before his death in 2003.

1. Queen  - Don't Lose Your Head

The album A Kind of Magic wasn't particular well-received with the critics, being largely a soundtrack to the (not-very-good - sorry, 80s fans, but it isn't) movie Highlander. And this isn't even one of the best songs on that album. So why do I love it, why do I give it Number One above all the excellent records that preceded it on this list?

Because it's very special to me. Although Queen's Greatest Hits was the first LP I bought (or I might have asked for it as a Christmas present), A Kind of Magic was the first of their studio albums I got into. I'd have been about 15 or 16 (so a couple of years after it's release, but I was a late developer in all things musical... I've been making up for that ever since) and I often spent my evenings baby-sitting for my sister or brother, both of whom are a good sight older than me, married young, and had kids (my nephews) who ended up being just a few years younger than their Uncle Rol. Much of that time I'd spend listening to their record collections, and I think both of them had copies of A Kind of Magic on vinyl... it was probably one of the few albums their collections had in common. I wore the grooves off this record, and eventually bought my own copy on which to do the same.

Don't Lose Your Head, then, isn't one of the great Queen songs. It's an average Roger Taylor album track (hence the drums are more prominent than any other instrument), distinguished slightly by Joan Aramatrading on guest vocals. But it's one of my formative musical experiences and, thus, irreplaceable.





Those were my headless chickens. Which is your Marie Antoinette?

My Top Ten Bang Songs

Because everybody enjoys a good bang. It's onomatopoeiatastic.

Special mention to The Bangles, natch.



10. Shirley Bassey - Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang

Not an official Bond theme, but written by John Barry and performed by Dame Shirl, it might as well be.

He's fast and he's cool
He's from the school that loves and leaves 'em
A pity if it grieves 'em
Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang's not a fool...

David Gedge stole the title for an excellent Cinerama song, but the internet let me down on that one.

9. B.A. Robertson - Bang Bang

The 70s king of bad lyrical puns strikes again!

Tony and Cleo struck out for the freeo down Egypt's way
But Caesar had squeezed her in Rome on his quilt for a day
Hey, hey

Now Anthony got really angry
Oh oh Caesar's hanky panky
She told em she would use em
And boy did she abuse em
Fall in love and blew em away

Ouch. That's B.A...D.

8. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs - Bang

And here's why I wouldn't ever... with Karen O. I couldn't handle the post-match commentary.

7. They Might Be Giants - Bangs

Why do Americans not just call it a fringe like everybody else?

6 Blur - Bang

Early Blur, from back when they were more baggy than Britpop. They Might Be Giants would consider Blur's haircuts perfect for this track.

5. Divine Comedy - Bang! Goes The Knighthood

Neil Hannon updates Noel Coward for the Miss Whiplash era.

So chain me, restrain me and teach me to kneel
Bind me and grind me beneath your high heels
Crack goes the whip and if someone should tell
Bang goes the knighthood, as well

4. Nancy Sinatra - Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)

Written by the late Mr. Bono (Sonny, not the other one... he's not late... and I don't want him ever to die because I don't think I'd be able to stomach the fawning obits) and originally a hit for his ex-missus. But Nancy's version edges that one out, for me... it's just that little bit more tragic.

3. Art Brut - Bang Bang Rock 'n' Roll

I'll admit it: my love of Art Brut is disproportionate to all the other, more famous artists in the history of pop music. Perhaps because I have a sneaking suspicion that if I'd ever had the guts to form a band, they've have sounded a lot like Eddie Argos and his motley crew. (They'd certainly have sounded more like Art Brut than they would Mötley Crüe.)

I don't want a girl that's with the band
I just want a girl that's gonna hold my hand
No more songs about sex and drugs and Rock and Roll
It's boring!

That said, I don't share Eddie's apparent disregard for The Velvet Underground.

We Are Scientists do an amazing cover of this track too... so good, it sounds like an actual rock song!

2. REM - Bang and Blame

According to Iffypedia, this was REM's most successful single since Shiny Happy People and they've not had a more successful record since. I find that a little hard to believe considering that makes it "more successful" than Man On The Moon, Drive, The Great Beyond, What's The Frequency, Kenneth? and Everybody Hurts (among others). Perhaps it was a much bigger hit in the rest of the world than it was in the UK? Anyway, it's a good song... but not as good as the ones mentioned above.

1. The Stone Roses - She Bangs The Drums

From the opening hi-hat tickles to the euphoric chorus, this could well be the Roses' finest moment: it describes the way we feel. (If only we felt that way more often!) And while many might balk at the idea of kissing Ian Brown where the sun don't shine, you can't fault his choice of breakfast: passionfruit and holy bread. Yum.




Which one gets you banging?