a song for the day

The Jim Jones Revue - Foghorn

2011-04-01T09:14:00.000+01:00

ORIGINATION Burning Down Your House
RECORDED IN 2010
LAST LISTENED TO day before yesterday
RATING ★★★★★

After seeing these guys going all-out on Monday night and then main-lining them most of the rest of the week, it is only a surprise it took this long for them to show up in my morning head. Foghorn is a pretty typical number from their latest album, sitting somewhere between good time rock 'n' roll, garage rock and with just a hint of the blues. The vocals, never more than a breath away from a soul scream, deliver the borderline-cliché lyrics with verve and passion, surrounded by soaring guitars, a piano that strays into Jerry Lee Lewis' madness and relentless drumming. A kick of adrenaline to start the day.

Jerry Lee Lewis - High School Confidential (Live)

2011-03-31T09:32:00.000+01:00

ORIGINATION "Live" At The Star-Club Hamburg
RECORDED IN 1964
LAST LISTENED TO October
RATING ★★★★★

In 1964, Jerry Lee Lewis had been recording music for nearly a decade, was several years from his last hit, had been more or less ostracised for his marriage to his teenage cousin and was out of fashion. Rock 'n' roll was dead, just a teen fad that had had its turn. The odds were clearly not in his favour on the one night he played with a pick-up band in the club that helped make The Beatles name. Yet against those odds, he not only prevailed, he recorded was must be one of the best, if not the best rock 'n' roll album. To be sure, the competition for that title is not fierce, yet even so there is no question that this would surely rule because Jerry Lee, The Killer, is absolutely on fire. Solid gone. His frenzied performance is barely contained, so much so that his young backing band can barely keep up with him, even though they give it a hell of a try. It is a manic performance, utterly deranged, and an absolute necessity for anyone with even a passing interest in rock 'n' roll, hell, with even a passing interest in music. Nothing has ever rocked quite like this and it is unlikely anything ever will again.

High School Confidential is one of Jerry Lee's hits from his period on top, before events turned against him. A fast-paced tune to begin with, here he attacks it without mercy, tearing to shreds. The band do their best to keep up but even so, around two minutes into the song you can hear them hurrying to catch the madman. You also get to hear that madman yelling at 'himself to play that thing' during his solo, before referring to himself in the third person. Deranged. Irreplaceable. Genius.

The Stooges - Cock In My Pocket

2011-03-30T09:22:00.002+01:00

ORIGINATION Head On
RECORDED IN 1972
LAST LISTENED TO a week ago
RATING ★★★★★

Yesterday I read a news article by a journalist who was either very pushed for time, or just plain lazy. It parroted and assertion made by the music industry that the recently-published decline in physical music sales in the UK is due to online piracy. Not only is this impossible to prove, indeed there never seems to be any proof attached to these statement but some of the proof available actually points to the opposite truth – that online piracy has led to an increase in consumption of paid-for music by these very pirates themselves. On top of that, there is the heavy irony of the music industry accusing others of piracy, given the notoriously tiny percentage of each sale that goes to the artist and that's when the CD is full price, one wonders if artists make any money at all from cut-price CDs.

Which brings me to this morning's song that I found on a double CD of bootleg recordings, apparently officially released, on sale at less than half price. Given the sound quality of the music, and at times the quality of the music itself, the price does seem rather appropriate, artist payments aside. The songs all come from the period when The Stooges where disintegrating between music contracts, although the energy in the music shows that they were still on top of their game. Cock In My Pocket is one of the most coherent songs on the collection. Focused and taken at a blistering pace, it gives the listener to wondering what would have happened to the Stooges if drugs had not taken their toll. As ever, and in particular due to the lyrics that would almost certainly never have seen a commercial release at the time, this is not music for the faint-hearted. From James Williamson's guitar to Iggy Pop's snarl, that is as raw and uncompromising as anything in The Stooges official catalogue. It also stands apart from that official sound with the addition of a piano, here not only used for colour as happened on occasion previously, but as a full part of the song. Indeed both the pianist Bob Sheff and Williamson are invited (or possibly directed) by Pop to takes solos during the song. Memorably Pop calls out Williamson by shouting "Any time James" during Sheff's solo. For an supposedly unfinished piece, it is quite a song.

The Politicians - Psycha-Soula-Funkadelic

2011-03-29T22:19:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION Come Together - Invictus Club Classics II (v/a)
RECORDED IN 1972
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
RATING ★★★★★

A fairly deep cut of funk rock took me from sleep this morning. It has, um, guitars, brass, a damned good intro, as well as some men shouting the title over and over. Although the latter does seem rather odd, given that they're not Funkadelic. All in all, pretty groovy.

Joy Division - Transmission

2011-03-28T09:05:00.000+01:00

ORIGINATION Heart And Soul
RECORDED IN 1979
LAST LISTENED TO two days ago
RATING ★★★★★

Is it about the power of music? An illustration of how it can give us the energy to transcend our difficulties? Or is it simply about dancing to forget them? It is tempting to let the history of Joy Division dictate the answer to this. Perhaps that is unfair. Better instead to just dance.

Tom Waits - Rain Dogs

2011-03-27T22:53:00.002+01:00

ORIGINATION Rain Dogs
RECORDED IN 1985
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
RATING ★★★★★

Few things in life as quite as fine as Tom Waits during his rebirth years of the mid-eighties. Rain Dogs was Waits' ninth album and the second in his move away from the lounge-style sound he was originally known for. The album is said to be about the urban dispossessed, which is seen by some as Waits straying into territory marked out in literature by Charles Bukowski. Whatever the truth of that assertion, the title track here does have something of that flavour to it, both in its impenetrably picturesque, booze-soaked lyrics and the strange thrift-store orchestra. It is a combination that Waits has been working in ever since, in his own unique way, and it is the reason why he has become such a worshipped cult figure.

John Barry - We Have All The Time In The World (Sung By Louis Armstrong) [again]

2011-03-26T09:49:00.000Z

ORIGINATION On Her Majesty's Secret Service LP
RECORDED IN 1969
LAST LISTENED TO last night
RATING ★★★★★

I had this one a few weeks ago.

Joyce Dunn - A New Change Of Address

2011-03-25T20:37:00.000Z

ORIGINATION Sister Funk
RECORDED IN 1970
LAST LISTENED TO last night
RATING ★★★★★

This morning's ingredients: great brass, fine drums, slightly opaque lyrics that could be euphemistic but on closer inspection are all about being done wrong, burning sax and just a hint of organ. Of such fine things is good funk made. The world seems to know little about Joyce Dunn, other than she released this single on Mercury in 1970 and that's a damned shame. If she recorded other tunes as good as this, the world really needs to hear.

Tito Puente - On The Street Where You Live

2011-03-24T08:42:00.002Z

ORIGINATION Beats & Pieces Volume Two: Music Constructed For A More Discerning Dancefloor (v/a)
RECORDED IN 1964
LAST LISTENED TO last night
RATING ★★★★★

Timbale player Tito Puente was known as the King of Latin Music and with good reason. He plied his grooves for over fifty years and helped popularise a whole genre of music for several generations. Today's tune comes from his latinisation of the score to My Fair Lady, where he turned this overdone Broadway chestnut into a swinging big band number. Puente's percussion is the heart of the song, ticking and swinging and driving. The blood that pumps through it is the two-note bass that runs up and down the scale, almost willy nilly. The body is the wind instruments, the big band that is so very well scored: a full blast of the band here, counter melodies between the brass and wood there and those fantastic, gradually built-up crescendos. The arrangement is just spot on, not only giving the band time to establish the melody and really swing with it, but also leaving plenty of space for Puente's rhythms. This is a song to stick on repeat, to smile and to feel those hips start to wander.

[radio silence]

2011-03-23T20:29:00.000Z

This morning was one of those rare silent mornings. It was odd. I lay in bed, with no song in my head and I listened to the world. Traffic moved on the next street down and out on the main road, an argument of herring guls held a discussion on the rooftops all around, my combi-boiler topped up its pressure, a neighbour took a shower and my radio alarm fizzed awake into detuned national morning radio. After a while, I got up.

Brenda Holloway - Every Little Bit Hurts

2011-03-22T09:23:00.001Z

ORIGINATION Tamla Motown: Big Hits & Hard To Find Classics, Vol. 2
RECORDED IN 1964
LAST LISTENED TO Sunday
RATING ★★★★★

It's strange that for a song as well-known as this, I only heard this version of it recently. For many years, I've known both the Small Faces and the Spencer Davis Group recordings of it but as is often the case, there is something in the original version that others just can't quite reach. Maybe it is in Ms. Holloway's smooth voice, the sweet strings or the earthy piano. Whatever it is, that near-inderfinable magic, it is enough to stand this version above all others. Tender and beautiful.

The Smiths - Girlfriend In A Coma

2011-03-21T09:21:00.001Z

ORIGINATION Best of the Smiths
RECORDED IN 1987
LAST LISTENED TO last week
RATING ★★★★★

I was quite a latecomer to The Smiths, after manfully resisting their unique charms throughout all of my youthfully foolish music clique years. It was more than a few years after that silly behaviour was done with that I finally purchased one of their albums, even then only opting for a collection. It has been over thirteen years since I bought that CD and somehow I am yet to buy another of theirs, which is rather foolish considering that I've enjoyed every song on that first-bought collection. I'm in no hurry.

Girlfriend In A Coma to me is the quintessential Smiths song: a clean, well-played pop tune with a dark heart.

Sunday morning mix up

2011-03-20T11:42:00.001Z

In the vague hour of my awakening this morning, no one song took charge of my brain. Rather, today saw a short playlist on rotation, including various Beatles songs, Damaged by Primal Scream and You Can Have Watergate Just Gimme Some Bucks And I'll Be Straight by Fred Wesley and The JBs. I lay in bed for a little while and each time I focussed on one song, it would slip away like a bar of soap in a hot bath, to be replaced by another.

Primal Scream - Movin' On Up

2011-03-20T10:58:00.001Z

ORIGINATION Screamadelica
RECORDED IN 1991
LAST LISTENED TO last night
RATING ★★★★★

It is one of my favourite starts to an album, a guitar riff that I will never confuse for anything else, signalling so much goodness to come. I would have first came across it in the year of its release. I'd have heard it in an indie disco and, knowing who I was back then, may well have sneered at it somewhat. In all likelihood, it was Loaded from the same album that I first came to know. However, two events changed my relationship to Movin' On Up.

To begin with, in the summer of '92 I saw Primal Sceam play a headline set at the Glastonbury festival, at the end of a brilliant sunny day. It was a magical night and even though I may have been perhaps a little tiddly, I remember that I really enjoyed their set, which shook my then particular, silly music clique snobbishness. Once I was home, I am sure I would have sought out the album. The second event happened two summers later, when I was in hospital. I was really quite ill, had dropped in weight to near eight stone and had been on a drip for days, only vaguely conscious. About four or five days into my stay, I was getting better and was at last properly with it, when I realised that I had not listened to any music in almost a week. I recall quite clearly lying in a bed, the only occupant in a strangely circular ward, when I slipped my headphones on and pressed play on my personal stereo. I did not bother to check what was in it, I needed music that badly. Screamadelica was the tape in the machine. As Movin' On Up began to play, I felt relief and joy flood through me and I wept. It moved me in a way almost no song had until that point and for that it will forever remain precious to me.

On Friday I went to see Primal Scream perform Screamadelica in Glasgow. They opened, naturally, with Movin' On Up. As Bobby Gillespie started singing, the audience, breaking from an immense cheer, as one sang along loud enough to near drown him out. It was the beginning to a brilliant gig.

Waking with this in my head the next morning was very much a foregone conclusion. It is a song that I can find not one flaw in, from the perfectly-paced beginning, though Bobby G's slightly off singing and the slide guitar licks, to the gospel choir and the guitar solo. It was a great start to the day.

Speedometer - Am I Your Woman? (Featuring Ria Currie)

2011-03-18T08:47:00.003Z

ORIGINATION Modern Funk: Stay On The Groove, Volume 3
RECORDED IN 2007
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
RATING ★★★★★

Waking up to funk is always good. This fine selection is from one of the lights in the new funk movement in the UK. Performing now for more than a decade, Speedometer here cover a hit from 1970 by the Chi-lites. This version follows in the fine funk footsteps of an answer record: where once the Chi-lites sang Are You My Woman?, here the question is turned back on the men. Incidentally, that lovely brass riff that peppers both versions of the song, was sampled from the Chi-Lites on Beyoncé's Crazy In Love, which apparently was a big hit.

The Merits - Arabian Jerk

2011-03-17T20:07:00.001Z

ORIGINATION Jungle Exotica Volume 2
RECORDED IN 1964
LAST LISTENED TO January
RATING ★★★★★

Sneaky. From somewhere in the dark, it's coming to get you. Well, maybe until the organ starts. After that it all turns into one of those mid '60s Arabian things. That sound was all the range, in a certain set. A sort of groovy, post-exotica thing. It didn't last long but it did throw out some weird and lovely things.

Prince La La - She Put The Hurt On Me

2011-03-16T09:28:00.005Z

ORIGINATION From Route 66 To The Flamingo (v/a)
RECORDED IN 1961
LAST LISTENED TO November
RATING ★★★★★

Some lovely soul this morning. Up tempo and bright. Really, I've got nothing more to add today. Just listen to that popping brass. Lovely.

Gogol Bordello - Alcohol

2011-03-15T09:48:00.004Z

ORIGINATION Super Taranta! CD
RECORDED IN 2007
LAST LISTENED TO last night
RATING ★★★★★

As the closing song of a very frantic gig, this really was perfect. Sang almost entirely solo, it was a calming, a breath, one small step before turning out into the night. On album, it is a reflection on a sorry drug that seems the cure to many and yet is more often than not the cause.

Barry McGuire - Eve Of Destruction

2011-03-14T09:23:00.001Z

ORIGINATION 45
RECORDED IN 1965
LAST LISTENED TO March 2010
RATING ★★★★★

I guess all the recent signs and portents in the world have infected my brain. I can't think of any other reason why this classic protest song would appear in my head this morning. It'll be that sinking feeling I get wherever I see a picture of our 'elected' leaders and read about how they're trying to destroy all that we hold dear in society. Happy joy!

The 5th Dimension - Puppet Man

2011-03-13T22:18:00.002Z

ORIGINATION 45
RECORDED IN 1970
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday, briefly
RATING ★★★★★

Funk! Yes! Well, almost. This starts out with a certain kind of late '60s variant of funk, at least until the singing begins. Once that happens, it rapidly becomes funk filtered through an easy listening pop choir, which, not to put too fine a point on it, is exactly what this is. The 5th Dimension were (and appear in some guise still to be) a pop group of five vocailists. Their best-known singles back in the day were Up, Up And Away and Aquarius/Let The Sunshine In. Following only a few years after those, Puppet Man does have something of the flavour of those two tunes to it, with more than enough 'bah-bah-bah-bah's for any fan or their work to enjoy. However for those non-easy lovers, the music is where it's at. From the drum roll intro on into the strong lead guitar fills, this is some fairly heavy funk rock. It is taken at a moderate pace and it has plenty bite to it. On paper, the two elements seem rather disparate, yet here they mesh really rather well.

John Barry - We Have All The Time In The World (Sung By Louis Armstrong)

2011-03-12T10:10:00.001Z

ORIGINATION On Her Majesty's Secret Service LP
RECORDED IN 1969
LAST LISTENED TO last night
RATING ★★★★★

This is a smooth, gentle and lovely, lovely song. The contrast of the sweet strings and the warmth of Louis' rough old voice is so prefectly balanced that. rounded out by the gentle trumpet tones he produces, makes it feel like slipping into a warm bath. For three minutes and eleven seconds all your worries will just slip away.

Lester Flatt & Earl Scruggs - Cabin On The Hill

2011-03-11T09:09:00.003Z

ORIGINATION Essential Country & Western (v/a)
RECORDED IN 1959
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
RATING ★★★★★

Whilst today's song is again from That Danged Country album, the one that has been haunting me for the past few weeks, it is one of the least country songs on it. With the only instrumentation being a lone guitar, the song features call and response singing between a male lead and a mixed choir. Although choir singing does have a history in country music, on record dating back to the Carter family's recordings in the late '20s, the singing here sits more firmly in gospel music. It is not exactly the kind of song that one would normally associate with Flatt and Scruggs, especially considering Scruggs' banjo is nowhere to be heard.

Johnny Cash - I Got Stripes

2011-03-10T08:37:00.004Z

ORIGINATION Essential Country & Western (v/a)
RECORDED IN 1959
LAST LISTENED TO a few days ago
RATING ★★★★★

Another morning and another country song (there do seem to have been a lot of them recently). Again it is the story of an outlaw, one who is caught on a Monday, at the very start of the song, and is sent to prison. Like many country songs, his outlaw status is more inferred than stated but what is inescapable is that he is suffering. This, of course, is a theme that seems pretty widespread in country music, taking many forms whether it be suffering in death, suffering in work, suffering in love. Johnny Cash helped set the standard for post-war country music, particularly with songs and themes such as this.

Spandau Ballet - Gold

2011-03-09T09:23:00.001Z

ORIGINATION the decade that taste forgot
RECORDED IN see above
LAST LISTENED TO in a restaurant last week
RATING ★★★★★

Imagine my disgust at finding this in my head this morning. My brain is wrong. I have nothing more to add.

Marty Robbins - El Paso

2011-03-08T09:02:00.002Z

ORIGINATION Essential Country & Western (v/a) CD
RECORDED IN 1959
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
RATING ★★★★★

I was rather unsurprised to find more country in my brain this morning. Quite why it was this song, I do not know. I've heard better and catchier in recent days. Not that it's all that bad. Of course it is yet another tale of a drying gunslinger (there do seem to be a lot of them), although this time with a Mexican twist. It might in fact be the pretty Mexican guitar styling that made this one stand out.

Einstürzende Neubauten - Pelikanol

2011-03-07T09:21:00.001Z

ORIGINATION Silence Is Sexy CD
RECORDED IN 2000
LAST LISTENED TO last night
RATING ★★★★★

Long-time German oddities Einstürzende Neubauten released Silence Is Sexy, one of their most successful albums, in 2000. A two-disc set, the second disc contained one single near-twenty minute long piece. Motorised metal strips throb deeply, mechanically and a child-like rhyme is repeated over and over. The world closes down, reality retreats. Humming, broken glass. Throbbing. As the piece progresses, the voices become stranger, flipping left and right, while white noise stabs irregularly, broken-speaker like. Over headphones, it is an intense experience.

Nur zur Erinnerung Just as a reminder
Bittermandel Bitter almonds
Marzipan Marzipan
Pelikanol Pelikanol (school glue)

Lefty Frizzell - The Long Black Veil

2011-03-06T12:03:00.002Z

ORIGINATION Essential Country & Western (v/a)
RECORDED IN 1959
LAST LISTENED TO a few days ago
RATING ★★★★★

Today finds me waking to another country song that, being Sunday, seems somehow appropriate. This one is another dark tale of a doomed man, sang by another country legend, Lefty Frizell. His clear voice with just the slightest hint of a lisp, wanders over a cleanly-strummed guitar that is framed by a minimal bass and some light drumming which echo with a sound Sun studio-like slap. Through all of this, a haunting pedal steel guitar slides, ghost-like, the spectre of the doomed figure of the tale, as he watches his best friend's wide mourning at his grave. It is a simple, elegant song that, although written in the '50s, seems of an earlier age.

[repetition]

2011-03-04T11:58:00.000Z

As I fell asleep last night, yesterday's morning song was rattling around in my head. It wasn't much of a surprise, therefore, that it was still in there when I woke.

Laura Lee - Crumbs Off My Table

2011-03-03T21:34:00.001Z

ORIGINATION I'm A Good Woman - Funk Classics From Sassy Soul Sisters (v/a) LP
RECORDED IN 1972
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
RATING ★★★★★

Mm-mm. Here's some deep funk. That Laura Lee, her man's spending too long out of the house working. When he comes home, she ain't getting none and, man, she is not happy. Funk is the going to be the answer, so expect some fat bass, plenty of slick wah-wah guitar licks and a few truck-loads of brass. Oh yes. After a few verses, the track drops down for some bass and drum action and just a few groans. That low-down bump and grind is just what the song needs. Ms Lee is hungry and there is no doubting it here. A few years ago, I thought this section killed the song. These days, that drop down and build following it is hitting the spot hard. The arrangement here is particularly strong, with the whole band slotting tightly in together; bass, brass and guitar all winding in and out of each other as, we might surmise, Ms Lee finally gets it. Go get some!

Plan B - Writing's On The Wall

2011-03-02T18:15:00.001Z

ORIGINATION The Defamation Of Strickland Banks CD
RECORDED IN 2010
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
RATING ★★★★★

Sometime in the middle of last year, a song on God's Jukebox had me scrambling about in the dark for my notebook, two write down its name. It turned out to be a single from London soul boy and rapper Plan B. I left that name sitting on my list of things to buy one day for quite some time. In January, I finally bought the album and, expecting to like the single and little else, gve it a cursory listen. I was pretty bowled over. Whilst still sounding modern, the album nonetheless manages to straddle a whole range of soul sounds and it does this whilst also telling a story. It is an impresive feat.

Writing's On The Wall is the latest single, quite astoundingly the sixth, to be culled from the album. It's a bittersweet piece of uptempo northern soul, powered by a strong bassline and some squeaky-clean guitar licks. Sadly, being the second song on a concept album, the song does feel somewhat unresolved at its close.

[repetition]

2011-03-01T10:46:00.001Z

It has only been a few days since Marty Robbins' Big Iron last stole into my head as I woke. It's always a little disappointing when the song is not a new one, although it does save some time.

Nirvana - Serve The Servants

2011-02-28T14:14:00.005Z

ORIGINATION In Utero CD
RECORDED IN 1993
LAST LISTENED TO October 2010
RATING ★★★★★

In Utero was a welcomely abrasive follow up to the slightly-too-polished Nevermind. Serve The Servants, the first track, sets well the tone for the album. Like much of Kurt Cobain's songs, it is very personal, dealing with his reaction to his sudden fame and fortune, as well as his relationship with his father. However, the opening couplet 'Teenage angst has paid of well / Now I'm bored and old", as well as being typically self-depreciating, appears to trivialise what music had gone before and in particular Nevermind. Whilst this is understandable, given the disturbed state of mind of Cobain at the time, it does seem somewhat insulting to those legions of listeners who gave him the freedom to voice that very thought. It is a dark and twisted song, which begs the question, who are the servants? The record company, the fans, maybe even his muse? There is no clear answer to this and paying such close attention will only bring the listener too close to the troubled mind of the author. Ultimately, it is a good song but one whose darkness can be wearying.

The Isley Brothers - Ohio / Machine Gun

2011-02-27T21:32:00.002Z

ORIGINATION Gimme Shelter: Kaleidoscopic Funk Collision (v/a) LP
LAST LISTENED TO April 2010
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT teeny
RATING ★★★★★

Formed in the early '50s, The Isley Brothers had always moved with the times. They'd sang gospel, doo-wop, gritty r'n'b, soul and funk and had been on RCA, Motown and their own label, T-Neck. In 1971, two generations of Isleys were in the group when they released an album of rock-tinged funk. The lead track on that album was a medley of Jimi Hendrix's Machine Gun and the Neil Young-penned Ohio. At over nine minutes in length, putting it up front on the album was a bold move but one that was absolutely warranted. The two songs, both forthright and powerful protest songs, were blended with such mastery that they sounded very much like they'd always been meant to be together. They added a whole world of soul to Ohio that it had never noticeably been missing, before segueing it imperceptibly into Hendrix's pièce de résistance, via the Lord's Prayer, whilst even having time to drop in a sprinkling of vocalised Hendrix guitar sound. It was and remains powerful, hairs standing on the back of the neck stuff. A very rare instance of the unimpeachable being transcended.

Buck Owens - Under Your Spell Again

2011-02-26T12:09:00.002Z

ORIGINATION Essential County & Western (v/a) CD
LAST LISTENED TO last night
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT dead certain
RATING ★★★★★

I'm still slowly working my way into country music and so my knowledge is pretty slim and my ear not very well trained. Even still, from this vantage point Under Your Spell Again sounds about as perfectly country as can be. It is a perfect mix of pedal steel, fiddle, snare-led drums and sweet, sweet harmonies. It is the kind of song that one almost instinctively knows, where every change is exactly where it ought to be and every vocal can almost be sung along with on the first listen. Such archetypal songs are rare indeed. I've known it for less than five days and it has already buried itself deep into my brain.

Marty Robbins - Big Iron

2011-02-25T22:40:00.002Z

ORIGINATION Essential Country & Western (v/a) CD
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT good
RATING ★★★★★

I first came across and enjoyed Big Iron on Johnny Cash's American IV album of 2003. Having not looked at the sleeve particularly closely, I did not realise it was one of the many covers he made during those recordings. It was therefore a pleasant surprise to come across the original version of it this week, on a damn fine compilation of recently copyright-free country and western music.

Marty Robbins, the writer and performer of that original, seems to have been a colourful individual, with a life that included not only being a country music star, but also the war in the Pacific, hosting his own television show, acting and race car driving. His version of the song feels considerably faster than Cash's and, with plenty of guitar picking, a high-tone upright bass and swathes of vowel-heavy backing vocals, has a lighter air. In some ways that lightness seems to clash with the tale of a killer and his death, yet there is something infectious in the bouncing tempo and the delightful guitar picking that is hard not to like.

[confusion]

2011-02-24T11:49:00.000Z

Things were a bit muddied this morning. It seemed that I had Sixteen Tons by Tennessee Ernie Ford in my head when I woke, except that I couldn't have as I'm not certain I've ever actually listened to it. Now, I had heard the original Merle Travis version of it this week, yet it definitely was not that version I was hearing. Nor was it the Bo Diddley version, which was the only other one that I had. To make things trickier, it was merged with parts of at least two other songs, neither of which I was able to identify. It was a confusing morning.

Georges Brassens - Je M'Suis Fait Tout Petit

2011-02-23T11:51:00.003Z

ORIGINATION French Café (v/a) CD
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT quite high
RATING ★★★★★

Georges Brassens was a respected figure in the French music scene of the last century, although seems little known elsewhere, almost certainly in part due to the hegemony of anglophone artists in popular music. In this song, as in much of his music, he accompanies himself on guitar, with just one other player on double bass. It is a lilting, elegant-sounding piece, sprinkled with Django-esque jazzy licks that punctuate Brassens' relaxed singing. Sadly, the content of the song is lost on me, as it has been more than twenty years since I last spoke any French. With songs as good as this, maybe it is about time I tried to do so again.

The Temptations - Since I've Lost You

2011-02-22T22:17:00.002Z

ORIGINATION Motown Special LP
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT purdy good
RATING ★★★★★

Awakening from a dream of a love gone, this song seemed like the perfect soundtrack. A beautifully arranged ballad with some very fine harmonies from a period of the Temptations history known more for its psychedelic soul.

Duke Ellington - Caravan

2011-02-21T10:32:00.001Z

ORIGINATION Classic Jazz Archive: Diminuendo In Blue CD
LAST LISTENED TO a few days ago
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT yes, there was some
RATING ★★★★★

Caravan is one of those pieces of music that most of us know, even if we don't know we know it. Co-composed by Duke Ellington and his trombonist Juan Tizol (or possibly just by Tizol himself), it has been recorded countless times since and is has come to be considered a jazz standard. The first recorded version in 1936 was by a band that seem very much to have been Ellington and co., however this, the first credited Ellington version was not released until the following year.

With its smooth, flowing melody, it has a strong middle-eastern flavour which combined with a jazzy primitive percussion sound, prefigures the exotica movement of the fifties. It begins with an opening statement of that melody, before giving way to a string of short solos. The longest of these goes to the trumpet, which rasps throughout the piece before busting in for a brief solo around the half-way point on a muted wave. The real star of the piece, though, is that haunting, exotic melody, which winds smokily in and out of almost the whole tune. It was that melody that has captured countless ears and been the impetuous behind the avalanche of versions over the past seventy-five years.

The Bees - A Minha Menina

2011-02-20T11:05:00.003Z

ORIGINATION Sunshin Hit Me CD
LAST LISTENED TO a few days ago
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT reasonable
RATING ★★★★★

A few years ago, I picked up a copy of The Bees third album, after hearing a few tracks from it on God's Jukebox. I liked it plenty and so a little later picked up their debut in a random second-hand music moment in Brum with the Doctor. To this day, it has failed to grab me in the same manner.

Today's track was the one that stood out for me, which is ironic as it is a version of a track by Os Mutantes, so perhaps I should finally get round to listening to them. Another thing I discovered about this track today was that it was licensed for an advert, along with another two of their tracks. It was at this point I stopped caring about The Bees.

[repetition]

2011-02-19T09:05:00.001Z

Whip crack away, whip crack away, whip crack awaaaaaay!

Doris Day - The Deadwood Stage

2011-02-18T10:32:00.001Z

ORIGINATION The Best of Doris Day CD
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT hilarious
RATING ★★★★★

If this doesn't make you smile, you probably shouldn't be here. Whip crack away!

Sister Sledge - Lost In Music

2011-02-17T09:46:00.002Z

ORIGINATION We Are Family LP
LAST LISTENED TO last April
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT reasonable: I've been lost in music often recently
RATING ★★★★★

There is more to this track than memory will provide. After breakfast this morning, when I decided to get the obligatory morning song listen over with, then write a few sentences and get on with my day, I did not expect much. One listen, a few sentences about disco things and done. This did not happen.

Essentially the disco anthem chorus is what one remembers, which is well-known enough to easily obscure the rest of the song. Yet when one listens with fresh ears, much more is revealed. As the song slowly builds, it quickly becomes apparent that this finely crafted piece owes as much to soul as to disco and, whilst disco in itself is not a bad thing, so too it is not a musical form associated with subtlety, which soul often is. Whilst here the driving beat firmly moves the song into the disco camp, there are also many subtle details, in the chicken guitar, in the tambourine down in the right channel, in that gradually built-up intro and in the lyrics looking for salvation through music, that are divinely soulful.

Lost In Music is a simple enough track which is put together really rather well, a fined honed piece with not a single wasted moment. It is rather a shame that it will be forever lumped in with the glittering blare of disco.

The Marcels - Blue Moon

2011-02-16T10:18:00.003Z

ORIGINATION 45
LAST LISTENED TO November
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT minimal
RATING ★★★★★

Now this is what I call a proper start to the day. My eyes had barely opened, in fact they probably weren't even that, when I that magical "bom bo-bo bom…" rattled around my head. Brilliant!

Blue Moon is one of those classic American that has become a standard. It was written by the renowned composers Richard Rogers and Lorenz Hart in 1934 and has countless versions of it have been recorded since. When The Marcels released their version in 1961, it retooled the song considerably, taking it from a ballad into an up-tempo doo-wop hit.

I first heard the tune when watching American Werewolf In London at a tender age in the mid eighties and I've loved it probably ever since. It's bouncing rock 'n' roll beat, endless made-up word stop-starts, five part harmony and Hart's sentimental lyrics make me smile every single time.

Danger Mouse & Sparklehorse - Angel's Harp (Feat. Black Francis)

2011-02-15T10:52:00.001Z

ORIGINATION Dark Night Of The Soul CD
LAST LISTENED TO two days ago
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT yadda yadda
RATING ★★★★★

It has a catchy chorus, one that has been rattling around inside my head since I picked up this album last month. The guitar is also quite good and there are some enjoyable electronic embellishments. Yet somehow, trying to focus on this as an individual track is almost impossible this morning.

Violent Femmes - To The Kill

2011-02-14T10:47:00.001Z

ORIGINATION Violent Femmes CD
LAST LISTENED TO three days ago
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT annoyingly high
RATING ★★★★★

I thought by not listening to them for a few days, that they might release their grip. I seem to be sadly mistaken. Today, there was yet another return to their first album, this time one of the least good tracks. It feels less tight than the rest, formless in places. Whilst that is undoubtedly the intention, and it does form a good counterpoint in its place on the album, it does not make for a particularly arresting song.

Metallica - Leper Messiah

2011-02-13T10:54:00.001Z

ORIGINATION Master of Puppets LP
LAST LISTENED TO last week
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT I have no idea any more
RATING ★★★★★

It was strange and it was grey outside, another quiet Sunday morning. The song was familiar, almost instantly so and yet it was not, this relaxed little melody that I knew so well. Smooth and quiet but something was not right. After a while, I realised that the relaxed little melody was Leper Messiah and somehow that did not seem odd, although odd it surely was because there is nothing about Leper Messiah that is relaxed. If there could be such a thing as a textbook metal song, then this is it. With its proper, choppy, stop-start riffage, its fierce vocals about nothing much in particular, the not-too widdly guitar solo and then the last-minute return to those head-noddingly great riffs that stop-start to a stop, this is tight, muscular, metal heaven.

Also worth mentioning is that Leper Messiah is from Metallica's best album, Master of Puppets. Whilst they recorded plenty other great songs before and are continuing to do so today, with its sophisticated combination of metal sounds and proper album-length, they have yet to surpass this album.

[radio silence]

2011-02-12T10:06:00.000Z

A quiet morning today. No song, not even one from the radio snatches. Just silence.

Violent Femmes - Please Do Not Go

2011-02-11T09:54:00.004Z

ORIGINATION Violent Femmes CD
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT rising farce
RATING ★★★★★

The Violent Femmes again? There are no songs of theirs that I dislike, howver writing about them for this many days in a row is a little tiresome. Please Do Not Go features a nice sing-a-long chorus. It is a slower song and, as ever, the up front Mariachi bass is great. There is a little falsetto singing in this one too. Nice.

Violent Femmes - Black Girls

2011-02-10T10:55:00.003Z

ORIGINATION Hallowed Ground LP
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT damned good
RATING ★★★★★

The Violent Femmes return this morning with another song from their second album and one that is a particular favourite of mine. It starts out in fairly typical Femmes style, with some up-tempo drums and that distinctive bass guitar sound, which soon evolves when tenor sax comes in to augment the first verses. However, it is not until those verses are finished that the song really breaks new territory, with a choppy, hard-blown sax solo that edges into Pharoah Sanders-style freedom, which is followed by some bird-call vibrato trumpet and then a Jew's harp. Even more oddness follows that, when all the the blown instruments start trading off each other. It is a magnificent piece in its setting, at once seemingly at odds with the folky punk (or possible punkish folk) of the Femmes, whilst at the same time being the logical extension of, and perfectly complimentary to, it. Singer Gano returns for the ending, almost yelling lines about "digging black girls" which in itself seems pointedly at odds with the faith-inspired verse the precedes it. Marvellous.

Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds - There Is A Kingdom

2011-02-09T13:10:00.002Z

ORIGINATION The Boatman's Call CD
LAST LISTENED TO December
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT teeny
RATING ★★★★★

Each time a new Bad Seeds album comes out, almost without exception, my reaction to it is muted. Usually for some months after my first listen, I am unsure about it, about this change to a known entity. Then comes a day that I think, "actually this is all right". By the next day the album will be on constant rotation and will stay there for many, many days. Boatman's Call was something of an exception, it was and is so quiet, so low-key, missing the usual Bad Seed bombast, that I never reached that week of constant rotation. However, over the years it has gradually ebbed into my conscious and finally, in the past few years, I have come to terms with it and it enjoys a special place in my heart. It is a quietly beautiful album.

All of this makes waking to a particular song from this album rather unexpected, especially one that I have never once sought out to listen to on its own. As with the whole album, it is quietly beautiful, centred around Cave and his piano, with minimal further instrumentation. It appears, on the face of it, to be about faith. However, unlike yesterday's song of faith, this one could as easily be a song of secular love. The line is, as ever with Nick Cave, a blurred one.

Violent Femmes - Hallowed Ground

2011-02-08T11:40:00.001Z

ORIGINATION Hallowed Ground LP
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT pretty high
RATING ★★★★★

After the last couple of morning songs, yesterday turned into Violent Femmes day, with three of their albums (which is all I have) on constant rotation. Most listeners rarely move beyond their classic first album and this is a real shame because the second album is just as good. It was culled from the same writing period as the first, and so contains something of the same flavour, yet it is a more ambitious and sonically diverse album. Today it was its title track that was with me when I woke.

Of the songs on the album, Hallowed Ground is the one closest musically to the first album, structured as it is around the strong up-front bass and guitar, although with the addition of some piano. Where it differs is through its the lyrics. Previously, they were centred around a post-pubescent world, on this album singer Gordon Gano's faith is the common theme. This song is a statement of faithful defiance against the coming apocalypse, which was close at the time of writing, and whilst the faith is strong it is not overt. This is not one of the brethren looking to bring you into the fold, rather it is a young man quietly asserting his beliefs.

Many found this statement of faith a reason to turn away from the Violent Femmes and it does seem at odds with the prevailing sentiments of rock music. Yet this was and remains more of an indictment of the listener than of what is a great album.

[repetition]

2011-02-07T10:55:00.001Z

Yep. Same as yesterday. Which, given how often it was played, is no surprise.

Violent Femmes - Gone Daddy Gone

2011-02-06T12:02:00.002Z

ORIGINATION Violent Femmes CD
LAST LISTENED TO very early this morning
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT not waking to it would have been a surprise
RATING ★★★★★

A stand out track from a stand out album. It is not the most obvious stand out track on the album and the album is not one of the most stand out albums in the world. Both are slow builders. The lyrics from the song repeat again and again on an internal loop long after the album has stopped playing, the album slowly, eventually has become a hit, popular with an endless tide of post-adolesents, an album to take to heart at that impressionable time and to never let go of.

As well as the endlessly repeating hook of the lyrics, Gone Daddy Gone has a xylophone* solo. A xylophone solo. If this does not convince you of its greatness, you ought not be here. Go now.

*that's the one with the wooden bars

Edward Sharpe & The Magnetic Zeros - Home

2011-02-05T10:48:00.002Z

ORIGINATION Megan
LAST LISTENED TO late week
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT vague
RATING ★★★★★

Some mornings only the briefest of snatches of a song is in my head. These are the testing mornings, especially if it just a riff. Luckily this morning it was lyrics and ones easy to identify. Unluckily, all of the time I lay in bed, I could remember not one more piece of the song, just the endless tumble of two state names.

This song was a gift from my lovely friend Megan and it is one of those songs that will always remind me of her, whenever I hear it. It is a charming boy-girl pop song about finding a home in love, "home is whenever I'm with you", that can't fail to bring out a smile. It also starts with whistling, has that state name tumble and ends with some sweet, sweet trumpet. I'm sold.

Iggy & The Stooges - Search And Destroy

2011-02-04T11:04:00.001Z

ORIGINATION Raw Power CD
LAST LISTENED TO last night
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT detonate for me
RATING ★★★★★

I do love The Stooges and this is one of their best. No question. From nine seconds in when James Williamson's first blistering guitar spits in, to Iggy's higher-pitch-than-normal vocals, to the very last bars, it does not let go for one second. It grabs you by the throat and pulls you along for the crazed ride, for three and a half minutes of pure adrenaline rush. There is little else like it and there is only one way to listen to it and that is a speaker cabinet-rattling volume. The neighbours can go take a hike.

Sadly, these days the world we live in intrudes on the cosy memory of revolutions past. Yesterday's artist is today's salesperson. Would that it were not. So now most times when I listen to The Stooges, I can't help but picture Iggy's face on the back of a bus, hawking insurance. I'm so lucky that I do not own a television.

"Here's the deal, folks, you do a commercial, you're off the artistic roll call forever. End of story. Okay? You're another corporate fucking shill, you're another whore at the capitalist gang bang and if you do a commercial, there's a price on your head, everything you say is suspect and every word that comes out of your mouth is now like a turd falling into my drink…" - Bill Hicks

Cerrone - Supernature

2011-02-03T10:43:00.002Z

ORIGINATION 45
LAST LISTENED TO this morning
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT um… good?
RATING ★★★★★

There was nothing in my head this morning, just words. It was the unsnoozed radio that provided the spark today, in quite an unlikely form for morning radio. Call me Mr. Cheater if you want, but it is today's song.

Supernature is about as great a piece of Euro-disco as can ever be found. Funky bass, layers of repetitive synth, a woman singing fairly odd lyrics. Seeming that it will roll on forever, with its occasional strange sort-of sound effects and loud whispers, somehow it is all over in just over four minutes. If ever there was a 45 that would benefit from having two copies to thread into each other, prefiguring house music if ever anything did, it was this one. Sadly I only have the one, that I bought from the Professor a little more than nine years ago (and how it be that long ago?). I find myself wondering if it was it one of his recommendations, or if I found it rummaging though a pile of that week's incomers.

As it happens, a few years later I found a copy of the 12" on eBay. I was both pleased and surprised to discover that rather than being a stretched and padded version of the 45, it was actually the full and unedited version, which was equally as good and, best of all, over ten minutes long.

Baby Charles - Hard Man To Please

2011-02-02T10:33:00.002Z

ORIGINATION Baby Charles CD
LAST LISTENED TO December 2010
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT limited
RATING ★★★★★

Songs such as this morning's and yesterdays can be quite a tester for my memory. Yesterday was not so bad, because I had the intro and part of the melody, however this morning all I had was one riff. It was new funk and that was as much of a feeling as I had from it. Quite why it was stuck in my head was a mystery. Perhaps it my subconscious reminding me to Pay More Attention To Funk.

After some time spent tracking it down, I found the riff was by Baby Charles, who appeared in my life very early one Saturday morning on Mark Lamarr's God's Jukebox radio show. Whatever track it was he played then, it caught my ears and the first thing I did after a night's sleep was to find their website and buy their album, a self-titled debut. It is a pretty fantastic slab of funk. Hard Man To Please, placed in the middle of that slab, has almost all of the things a top funk tune needs: whacka-whacka guitar, slip-sliding organ, brass stabs, some good repetitive lyrics and a change of chord last section. If the bass was not so often lost in the mix this would certainly be getting played more often, which would have made its tracking down this morning easier.

Even though this is not the best track by Baby Charles, it will give you a good taste of what they are like. Sadly, if you like that taste there will only ever be one album, as they split last year.

Benny Poole - Pearl Baby, Pearl

2011-02-01T10:22:00.002Z

ORIGINATION 45
LAST LISTENED TO May 2010
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT you're kidding, right?
RATING ★★★★★

In the early part of this century, I was regularly visiting the hallowed Professor of Plastic and picking up all manner of wonderful slabs of vinyl, both big and small. It was a time when new funk and soul 45s would arrive every week, some new, some reissues. This one, a reissue on a split single with Magentica by Espen Horne on the flip, was given a release in early 2002. It is a rough and tough, piece of latin-flavoured, instrumental soul, with a groove that sounds much more like it was recorded in the mid-sixties than in 1974.

After an intro with the first note cut off on this pressing, a tenor sax establishes a melody and then slips into a mid-range solo that could groove on forever. However, with a scant 45 running time of two minutes, it does no such thing. It has only been in the sweet spot for a minute, when the organ swings in from the background for a few brief bars to fight it out and then it is all gone. A fine, fine groove that could easily be much longer.

John Barry

2011-01-31T10:02:00.001Z

The first alarm call of the morning was a brief interlude of a radio presenter saying something about James Bond scores. The third call was during a news break, where the reader mentioned something close to "he won five Academy Awards". I woke up then, realising that another musical legend was gone. If there was any morning song in my head, it was washed away in a tide of Barry goodness. Here are just two of my favourites.

Joy Division - Means To An End

2011-01-30T11:25:00.003Z

ORIGINATION Closer CD
LAST LISTENED TO last night
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT goodie goodie yum yum
RATING ★★★★★

It seems appropriate that on such a bleak morning, grey, overcast and lifeless, that Joy Division would be in my head. There is and almost certainly always will be an association between their music, their sound, and darkness; a near-tangible miasma of unhappiness, of gloom, that is inescapable. For me this makes them difficult to listen to, which is unfortunate because they made some very good music.

Means To An End is from their second (and in some ways last) album. To my untrained ears, it seems typical of their sound. Hooky's bass is front and centre, driving the tune, framed by machine-like drums, whilst jagged, skeletal guitar breaks around the incessant rhythm. Over it all is Ian Curtis, the dark centre.

I don't listen to Joy Division very often and I doubt I ever will.

Public Enemy - Fight The Power

2011-01-29T13:03:00.004Z

ORIGINATION Fear of a Black Planet CD
LAST LISTENED TO last night
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT pretty bloody high
RATING ★★★★★

I was first intoduced to Public Enemy at the height of their powers at the beginning of the '90s. On a trip to Italy in '91 I picked up a copy of It Takes a Nation of Millions. Most likely it was because I had spending money and decided I would rather use it on music, than on some local tat. It was a bold, provocative album and it still is, however it is its successor that I listen to more often these days.

For me, Fear of a Black Planet is bolder, louder, longer and packs more hits. Biggest and boldest of all is the closing track, Fight The Power, which is both one of their funkiest tunes and their most relentless. Deceptively simple sounding, it is as intensely-woven as any Bomb Squad track, a bold mix of beats and samples that keep rolling and bouncing on and on, funky and tough. Over it Chuck D's rap is conscious, unyielding, calling for something more than peacefull acceptance of how things are. It flows smoothly, hitting on the beats, interspersed with some of jester Flav's less wacky interjections, giving Chuck pauses to catch his breath.

There is a fire here, of young bloods looking to kick down the old. Do they really think Elvis was a racist? Or are they rabble-rousing, beating on sacred cows? With PE and Chuck, you just never can tell.

The Jacksons - Blame It On The Boogie

2011-01-28T10:25:00.002Z

ORIGINATION the damned radio
LAST LISTENED TO now
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT bah
RATING ★★★★★

It blundered its sunlight way into my head across the moonlight airwaves and through a slightly forgetful good times radio alarm clock boogie. There had been a sunlight tune in there, in my barely awake moonlight brain, but it withered good times and was burnt away by the might of the Jacksons boogie. I was sunlight powerless to moonlight retain information good times on it boogie. And so sunlight this morning is a moonlight cheat, a breaking of the good times rules I set for my boogie self. I am sunlight so very moonlight pleased by good times this boogie. Sunlight. Moonlight. Good times. Boogie. Sunlight. Moonlight. Good times. Boogie. Sunlight. Moonlight. Good times. Boogie. Sunlight. Moonlight. Good times. Boogie.

Scott Joplin - The Entertainer

2011-01-27T11:26:00.004Z

ORIGINATION er-hm
LAST LISTENED TO unknown
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT zero and technically still there
RATING ★★★★★

This morning, again, I woke with no song in my head. However, as I sat eating my breakfast several hours later, this tune just slid on in there. I'm not sure I've ever actually chosen to listen to it in the past. Sure, like most kids in my school I was taught how to play it on the xylophone (or possibly glockenspiel) and of course I've seen The Sting but that's been about it. Now I'm wondering what took me so long to have a listen. It really is a joyful and timeless piece.

The Doors - Love Street

2011-01-25T08:54:00.007Z

ORIGINATION Waiting For The Sun CD
LAST LISTENED TO early December 2010
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT low
RATING ★★★★★

I've been listening to the Doors for twenty years, which is not as long as some have, but long enough. For what it's worth, their debut was the very first CD I bought. Today's song is from their third album, when their initial rush of inspiration was beginning to run thin. It is one of the lightest songs on the album and is neither strong lyrically nor musically. Doors-lite. For all that, it is as indelibly etched onto my brain as most of the rest of their catalogue.

The Kills - U.R.A. Fever

2011-01-24T22:37:00.006Z

ORIGINATION Midnight Boom CD
LAST LISTENED TO May 2010
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT minimal
RATING ★★★★★

A couple of years ago I was sitting in a bar, eating a late lunch as the low winter sun disappeared somewhere behind thick cloud cover. The bean burger and chips were warming and filling, however my enjoyment of them was gradually intruded upon by the music playing. I realised I was nodding along, and had been for a little while, to a sparse bluesy-rock sound that was pretty appealing. Eventually I asked the bartender what he was playing and he named a band I had never heard of. On my way home I bought the album: Midnight Boom by The Kills.

U.R.A. Fever is the opening track of the album. It's a low-key beginning, that nonetheless signals clearly the dislocated boy-girl singing, rough guitars and slight electronic tinge typical of the whole album. The skeletal frame of the song is hung with enough hooks, in both some choppy guitars and a memorable repeated lyric ("U.R.A. fever / ain't born typical"), to make it memorable.

Duran Duran - Friends Of Mine

2011-01-23T12:10:00.006Z

ORIGINATION Duran Duran LP
LAST LISTENED TO a few days ago
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT average
RATING ★★★★★

An album track this time and one that sounds very much a song of its period, a piece of slithering '80s pop-funk with electronic leanings. As albums go, this being Duran Duran's debut it is pretty strong, making Friends Of Mine quite a well-crafted song rather than a piece of filler. The influence of tracks like this, particularly the guitar sound and Simon Le Bon's vocal inflections, can clearly be heard in the music of many of the current '80s-leaning bands.

[repetition]

2011-01-22T19:21:00.004Z

Same as yesterday. No surprise.

Duran Duran - Planet Earth

2011-01-21T12:18:00.003Z

ORIGINATION Duran Duran LP
LAST LISTENED TO last night
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT absolute certainty
RATING ★★★★★

It is Easter 1984 and the two leaving-year classes are on the annual school trip to West Germany, to the Rhineland, by bus. To this day the decision to do it and who took it is lost, however the fact remains that a tape of Duran Duran, almost certainly a home-made compilation one of the girls brought along, was played on the coach stereo for almost the entire trip, repeated and repeated and repeated, until every tune was etched into our minds. Of all those endlessly-heard songs, Planet Earth is the one that stuck indelibly. It will forever conjour the freedom of the autoroute and of the autobahn, the particular alert weariness of long distance travel, mid-eighties Europe and seeing the Atomium slide by on the horizon.

Even if Planet Earth had a catalogue of faults, I would always look on it favourably and so an objective opinion would never be possible. It is one of those songs that will stay with me forever.

Angelo Badalamenti - Freshly Squeezed

2011-01-20T10:05:00.004Z

ORIGINATION Twin Peaks
LAST LISTENED TO every day for a week
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT astronomic
RATING ★★★★★

When Twin Peaks hit the nation's television screens at the start of the last decade of the twentieth century, I was just a little young to fully appreciate the leap forward in programme making that it represented. Nonetheless I enjoyed it thoroughly.

Film director David Lynch was one of the driving forces behind the show and of all the cinematic elements he introduced, for me it was the soundtrack that made the strongest impression. Strongly jazz-influenced and scored by long-time Lynch associate Angelo Badalamenti, it was and is almost unique in its filmic approach to television. It contains several leitmotifs, not least of which is the cyclic, strolling bass line that features prominently in Freshly Squeezed.

The piece was first introduced onscreen when FBI Agent Dale Cooper, who is having breakfast at his hotel, is approached by coquettish teenager Audrey Horne. Something of the multi-level nature of that encounter is carried in the music, which is playful yet holds the sexual undertones.

The two most important elements of the piece, however, are the cycling bass and the vibraphone. The bass is the very epitome of cool, which oozed from many of the show's characters and in particular Agent Cooper. Good or bad, the inhabitants of Twin Peaks were almost all very cool and the bass line, repeated with variations across several parts of the score, reinforces that impression. In contrast, the ethereal modulation of the vibraphone represents the show's dream world, again most commonly shown in Agent Cooper. In the combination of these two sounds, Freshly Squeezed has become for me the part that most represents the whole.

Caro Emerald - Back It Up

2011-01-19T11:46:00.037Z

ORIGINATION Deleted Scenes From The Cutting Room Floor CD
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT pretty good
RATING ★★★★★

A few weeks ago, whilst engaging in my ongoing struggle with the snooze button, my hand paused on its way to the button. There was something playing that snapped at my half-awake brain's attention. I listened to the song, grabbed my pen and wrote the name on my hand, hit snoozed and kept on at that for a while longer. Mid afternoon, when I took my gloves off to make my lunch I found the note. After some searching, I figured out what it meant and I was excited because it was something new and fun.

Caro Emerald, the name that I found mis-spelled on my hand is a Dutch jazz singer. Her debut album spent, from which this was the first single, spent an amazing 30 weeks at number one in the Dutch charts. The song is a lovely slice of poppy jazz, with a bouncy percussive groove, some nice and fat brassy stabs and over it all Emerald's bright vocals dance. A fresh and fun meeting of old and new.

The Newcranes - Frontline

2011-01-18T12:15:00.007Z

ORIGINATION Frontline LP
LAST LISTENED TO September 2010
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT slim
RATING ★★★★★

Back in the early ’90s, not washing was all the range amongst certain student circles. Crust was in, clean was out. The Levellers ruled all. The far lesser-known Newcranes were always lumped into that crowd, whether they liked it or not. However, their sound owed far more to Eastern European musical traditions that British ones. Notably here, on the title track with its Ukranian male choir intro and predominant accordian melody.

Mandrill - Fat City Strut

2007-02-03T17:03:00.001Z

ORIGINATION The Avalanches' Breezeblock Headline Set, 26/02/01
LAST LISTENED TO last week
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT medium rare
RATING

Oh, this is a tricky one. For starters, i only know the intro from the tune. However, as far as intros go it is a cracker. Big and sassy in classic blaxploitation style. It is a 'strut' title, after all. Sadly, since i only know this tune from part of a mix set, i can't really say much about it. I know that i should know more about it, and probably acquire a copy, but i haven't. I do know (from amazon) that it changed course radically after the top intro, into a latinish direction. Whether or not it returns to the funk later is unknown me. Oh well.

Kiss - God Gave Rock And Roll To You

2007-02-02T12:25:00.001Z

ORIGINATION Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey
LAST LISTENED TO mayber once about seven years ago
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT teeny
RATING

I've never been a fan of Kiss. Actually, to be more honest i've just never been too interested. Ok, to be fair there was a brief interest in my days of youth when they were doing their Crazy Nights guff, but that didn't last. Through the joys of the intarwub i have of late found some of their 'classic' works and there have been a few moments of okness. Nothing that has ever really done it for me though.

God Gave Rock And Roll To You i know purely from Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey and once in a while the song's pompous nonsense is moderately enjoyable. I guess pompous nonsense were really Kiss's bywords. At least they are in my head.

Track down a copy of this behemoth, listen to it a few times and then get rid of it. Heaven forbid anyone should think you're a Kiss fan. We all know about Kiss fans.

Further Kiss songs:
Crazy Nights

MEIN GOTT!
Having just looked through the archive, i have noticed that it was Kiss that got me started on this blog some time ago. And, after many months away, it's them that got me at it again. That's not right. What is it about Kiss that makes me want to tell the world i have them in my head. Oh dear hod. That has left a truly disgusting thought in my head of Kiss in my head. I feel sick. Got i hate them now.

It's a purging thing, isn't it? By sharing this crap with the world, it gets it out of my head and i can continue with my day in a normal fashion.

Jet Set Willy / Fiddler On The Roof

2006-09-08T11:31:00.004+01:00

If you have no idea what the above title means, then i'm afraid that i'm not going to be the one to enlighten you. It's the kind of thing you're better off not knowing. This happened because yesterday there was a short conversation about old games platforms and my old 48k came into it.

Oscar Brown, Jr. - Dat Dere

2006-09-02T11:23:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION 7"
LAST LISTENED TO last night
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT pretty good
RATING

It's a nice piece of vocal jazz, all about a wee boy asking his dad endless questions. Sometimes the questions get wild, like Daddy can i have that big elephant over there. It's a touching song by a father who wants to set his kid on a good path into life, with a main melody supplied by a piano. The supporting cast features a muted trumpet that underscores the vocal lines in a few sections, and some relaxed drumming and percussion. A simple song that, unusually for jazz, has vocals instead of solos, indeed they are a direct replacement here.

Fried Eggs

2006-09-01T11:59:00.001+01:00

Ok. I know i wrote a while back that this wasn't the place for my own stuff, but rules are made to be broken and if there is one thing in life i can be sure of, it is never to say never to anything. Apart from having a mullet. I'll never do that, i am quiet certain. Quiet at the back! I have NEVER had one. Yes, i know when it grew in back in my teen metal days it looked a bit like i did, but i didn't. Really. Ok?

Ricky and I have been working on some new songs. It's been about ten years since we first worked together, although to be fair there was a fairly large gap when we were both doing other stuff. In fact, those ten years were probably more gap than music, but i digress. We're been making new stuff and this time it's mostly us playing. We're got kit and we're loving playing it.

This tune was started last friday and finished on monday. It's working title came from being started on a friday: friday, fried day, fried eggs, see? Words are really not our strong point. Which is also why we haven't got a name for ourselves (suggestions are welcome).

So, do let us know what you think.

[repetition]

2006-08-31T23:57:00.004+01:00

Look, it was only yesterday. No fair. Better tomorrow please.

Laura Lee - Crumbs Off My Table

2006-08-30T22:16:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION I'm A Good Woman - Funk Classics From Sassy Soul Sisters
LAST LISTENED TO last night
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT screaming satellites
RATING

It's funky and it's about not getting it. You know: it. You do.

The song starts with a swelling brass and wah wah intro, which is always going to go down well. As is the great key change leading into the bridge before the first chorus. The chorus, like many of the lyrics, are suggestively colourful: You've got me hungry for your lovin' - you ain't able / All you want to give me is the crumbs off your table. Such is the manner of the song.

Sadly at a minute and a half it all unravels, when a drum and bass break cuts in. Admittedly, it does build back up over the next minute but it feels like time wasting and it's too much of a drop down, without enough of a build up either before it or after. It kills the heart of the song stone dead. Not only that, but it's also a wasted opportunity for the kind of mischievous groaning sounds that we know all funkers love to make in these breaks, especially considering the subject of the song. If you're going to make a song that is already well down the lewd path, why chicken out half way down it? The song has such promise, so it's quite a let down. Even the ever-pleasing peal of the wah wah isn't enough to rescue this.

If it was only two and a half minutes, it might've gotten an extra star. Sadly, it just goes on that minute too far.

The Beatles - Come Together

2006-08-29T20:34:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION Abbey Road
LAST LISTENED TO mostly quite a while ago
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT fair
RATING

See, the thing was, i heard a sample of this yesterday and i heard it many times, so it was bound to stick. Well, sort of.

It's the Beatles at their funkiest with a chunk of lyrics knicked from Chuck Berry's You Can't Catch Me and probably the finest bass line that McCartney ever produced. I 'm writing nothing else about him now. See? No mention of frogs. Let us just forget about the last 36 years and remember the Beatles at their best.

Distraction

2006-08-27T20:28:00.001+01:00

This morning i was a bit distracted when i woke up and i completely forgot to pay attention to the little songs in my head. I do remember that there were a lot of them and, being that i saw a big band yesterday, there's a good chance Glenn Miller was involved in it somewhere. On which subject i ask, why do big bands, in this country at least, always insist on playing Glenn Bloody Miller (and almost nothing else). It's as if none of them have ever heard of Duke Ellington of Count Basie, to name but two. Honestly. Bloody whitewash.

Ricky

2006-08-26T18:04:00.001+01:00

Today doesn't count. What i had was a guitar riff that Ricky was playing yesterday on a song we were working on. So not only is it not even a finished song, but it is one of my own and they don't get a mention here.

Ennio Morricone - Farewell To Cheyenne

2006-08-25T20:20:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION Once Upon A Time In The West
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT mucho high
RATING

It's back again. It can be found here.

Office bugs

2006-08-24T14:23:00.001+01:00

Today i woke with something i had heard from the shared music pool in the office. Not only is it a song that i don't like, but i have no idea who it is by or what it is called and i don't wish to either. In fact, i have removed it from my head already using the patented Morricone magic. It as probably by Richard Ashcroft or some such other nonse.

Nowt

2006-08-23T12:44:00.001+01:00

I forgot to remember to forget today. Or whatever. No song number whatever.

Stevie Wonder - Isn't She Lovely

2006-08-22T16:45:00.002+01:00

ORIGINATION no idea
LAST LISTENED TO never
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT should be nil
RATING

No, no, no. The contrast between the extreme goodness and extreme badness of Stevie Wonder's music never ceases to amaze. This is nasty, nasty over-sweetened soul that is enough to make your teeth fall out. Don't go here.

Quiller - General Direction

2006-08-21T13:49:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION 7"
LAST LISTENED TO last night
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT mighty high
RATING

This one appeared way back in January.

Honey Boy Martin - Dreader Than Dread

2006-08-20T12:48:00.000+01:00

ORIGINATION 400% Dynamite
LAST LISTENED TO last week
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT reasonable
RATING

I really have no idea what this is about. Being that it is rocksteady era Jamaican, there is a good chance that it is about being hard in some way. There's a few things that support this: firstly, there is the song title which could be seen as threatening and secondly the song does contain a threat that 'anyone trying to stop rude boys… will end up dead'. However, the call for unity and the meeting format of the lyrics confuse things.

In fact, that's what this is song is about: a rude boy meeting. It's all so clear now.

Incidentally, the music is a fine piece of loping rocksteady that just rolls along nicely.

Count Basie & His Orchestra - Did You See Jackie Robinson Hit That Ball?

2006-08-19T12:52:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION The RCA Blues & Rhythm Revue (v/a)
LAST LISTENED TO last week
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT quite good
RATING

It's so nice to finally have the Count here. He was one of the most important band leaders of the swing era, who played with his big band for over fifty years. This song was recorded at the tail end of the swing era, when smaller (and cheaper to run) bands were taking over. Their stripped-down and more raucous sounding, this style became known as rhythm 'n' blues and was as much a child of swing as the blues.

Count Basie And His Orchestra were clearly dipping a toe into that sound with this tune. Whilst it opens with the kind of big brassy fanfare you'd expect, what happens next comes as a surprise: a vocal. We get treated to several verses about the baseball player Jackie Robinson, interspersed with the full band singing the chorus.

The song fits into the smoother end or r'n'b, apart from the short solo section. Here the big band returns to support two short solos, the second of which is taken by a fiery trumpet and is really swinging.

This is not your every day Basie number, but none the less it's a cracker.

Ennio Morricone - Farewell To Cheyenne

2006-08-18T08:23:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION Once Upon A Time In The West
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT high
RATING

Thanks and respect must be paid to the Ennio Morricone Experience, who are performing at this year's Edinburgh Fringe as the Spaghetti Western Orchestra. Their great performance has filled my head with Morricone for over a week now. If you get a chance you really ought to go see them.

Farewell To Cheyenne (a part of their show that can be see here) is quite a slow tune, whose rhythm is the simple clip-clop of a tired old horse combined with the homely sound of a strummed ukelele.

The main theme is played by a variety of instruments and runs through the whole piece. A piano and some kind of string instrument (the Ennios used a box, stick and string affair) come first, separated into either channel. There's a real jangly, old western saloon sound to the piano, whilst the string sounds twangy and oddly flat. It makes for a light-hearted tune that may not be what you'd expect if you're only familiar with the Dollars 'trilogy' music. However, a change of key and a whistler taking over from the string soon reminds you that it's still Morricone.

Of all his western music, this is probably the closest he ever came to sounding like western music. Or, at least, the music associated with western films before he redefined the whole genre. It's simplicity and air serve to show the range and skill of this prolific composer.

The Monkees - Last Train To Clarksville

2006-08-17T14:31:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION The Best Of The Monkees
LAST LISTENED TO last night
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT annoyingly high
RATING

I'm never been too sure of the Monkees. It's manufactured pop music, which just doesn't sit right. However, i did enjoy watching their antics as a kid (on repeats, by the way) and they do appear to actually play their own instruments (for at least some of the time). So maybe they're ok and anyway, when you're listening to pop music, it doesn't pay to wave around the 'manufactured' label. You might hit Motown or Stax or even a good deal of Jamiaca, depending on which way the wind is blowing.

Anyway, Last Train To Clarksville has always been one of my preferred Monkee moments. It abounds with a variety of both guitar and vocal hooks and is driven by a simple rhythm that favours the tambourine. Basically, it is as close to being the Beatles as the Monkees ever got which is no bad thing, even if that is what the manufacturers intended. The most interesting part of the Monkees career, however, is that which happened once they broke this particular mould. But that's another story…

Bob Marley - One Love

2006-08-16T13:14:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION dunno, around
LAST LISTENED TO many years ago, except for last night when Bill Bailey made us all listen to it in his show
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT irritatingly good
RATING

I just can't be bothered with Bob Marley. I'll admit it might be due to musical snobbishness. Or, then again, maybe it's just that i don't like his music. Although it's hard not to like, so i dunno. What's most likely is that it's due to his ubiquity. He is the only Jamaican artist most people ever hear, which is pretty sad.

One Love, along with No Woman, No Cry are the most over-played of all of his tunes and, consequently, are the two i am most sick of hearing. Take it away.

Thurston Harris - Little Bitty Pretty One

2006-08-15T20:43:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION From Route 66 To The Flamingo (v/a)
LAST LISTENED TO yesterday
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT good, rising
RATING

A little bit of rhythm 'n' blues is always welcome 'round these parts of a morning. This one, like Professor Longhair's of a days past, is pretty simple - just piano, drums and a pile of vocals. Harris takes the main vocal with a relaxed tenor and plenty of assured humming. He's backed by at least a trio od doo-woppers who hum and bum along for the whole track.

It makes for a delightful track that happily straddles the ground between rhythm 'n' blues and doo wop.

The Return Of The Monday Morning Mess

2006-08-14T11:12:00.001+01:00

Today the chorus of Barbara George's I Know (You Don't Love Me No More) was banged up against Three Little Maids from Gilbert and Sullivan's The Mikado. The first is a reasonable soul tune and the second is, um, well, i really couldn't say. It's not something i have ever listened to and i am pretty doubtful that i ever will.

Professor Longhair - She Ain't Got No Hair

2006-08-13T10:28:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION Honky Soul, Race Music, Hard Bop & Anachronic Jazz (v/a)
LAST LISTENED TO last week
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT ok-ish
RATING

Down-home, piano-led rhythm 'n' blues from New Orleans, that was recorded more than 50 years ago. There's not much to it. The Professor signs and tinkles his ivories, with the accompaniment of some simple drums and a little backing vocals. It's about the wife of a friend of his who, well, ain't got no hair. Looka there! It would appear that having no hair is a bad thing.

The White Stripes - Little Room

2006-08-12T09:11:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION White Blood Cells
LAST LISTENED TO a few days ago
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT goodish
RATING

Forty-five seconds of whiney White Stripe voice and drums. No guitar. Leave it alone.

Babe Ruth - The Mexican

2006-08-11T10:58:00.001+01:00

ORIGINATION Funkrock: Rock Breaks And Guitars For Funky People
LAST LISTENED TO May
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT lowish, although there's been a lot of Morricone action since seeing the Spaghetti Western Orchestra
RATING

It's one of those tunes that turns up regularly on breaks compilations. The reason for this, however, is nothing to do with any break in this tune. It doesn't really have one. Instead it's all about its the second part.

The first part of the tune starts out with a little Spanish guitar, before things heat up in a Santana-y way, albeit with less percussion but with heaped tablespoons of funky, distorted guitar and electric piano. Has it something to do the the Mexico-US was? Hard to say and, frankly, who cares: once the second part gets going, you'll forget all about it. That's because the whole second part is, basically, a funk rock version of the Theme For A Few Dollars More.

It's every bit as good as can be hoped for. That funky, distorted guitar and electric piano play the main theme in tandem, with one the left channel and one in the right. The funky beats from the first part keep on rolling and, to top it off, there is even some wah-wah guitar down in the mix.

That's why it's always turning up on breaks comps. It's not because of any incredible break - there is none here. It's because if you were at a block party, who wouldn't want to dance to funky Morricone?

Paul Bloody Weller

2006-08-10T19:57:00.001+01:00

This morning's song was by Paul Bloody Weller. I neither know nor care one jot what it was because it was by Paul Bloody Weller, a man in whose work i have no interest. Sod 'im and his 'Modfather' nonesense and ludicrous sideys.

Neil - A Hole In My Shoe

2006-08-09T19:33:00.002+01:00

ORIGINATION who gives a
LAST LISTENED TO can't say i have
CHANCE OF WAKING TO IT bugger all
RATING

No, no, no, no. No. Really. No. I have nothing to say about this. Nothing at all. Seriously.

(radio silence)

2006-08-08T21:45:00.001+01:00

Ah now. This is getting silly. Seriously. What do you think you're doing Mr. Brain?

To be fair, i was in a bit of a hurry this morning and it was early, so i didn't really give my head a chance to come on-line before it was being pumped with walking music.

With luck normal service will be resumed shortly…