Welcome back to our wander down memory lane, where we revisit all of the records in the Now That’s What I Call Music series (until I get bored of writing it, that is). Many thanks too all who left much kinder comments after the last instalment, and especially to JC who flagged to me that former regular Chain contributor The Great Gog, who, if memory serves, had a blog but hadn’t actually gotten round to writing anything back then, is currently writing about old issues of Smash Hits he bought back in the day. If you’re enjoying the nostaglia-fest I write here, you might want to check out his blog Wasting Time in the Study. At the time of writing this, he’s on September 20 – October 3 1979, so I suspect at some point there may well be some synchronicity between his blog and this series.
Since he’s far too modest to self-publicise, I also wanted to flag the Shakedown series JC writes over at his ever-wonderful blog The (new) Vinyl Villain, where he takes a month-by-month “look back at the 45s that were making all the noise in 1979” He’s currently on April, having previously completed the same task for 1983.
Enough with the plugs, although it’s perhaps better if we all promote our peers blogs than when, say, former Prime Ministers attempt to big up their new book (wait for it…):
Let’s get going, shall we? As always, feel free to reveal which of these you bought back in the day via the Comments section, and remember, we’re not here to judge you (although we may take the piss a bit).
Now if ever a song deserves to be described as an era-defining greatest hit, it’s probably this one. Relax first entered the UK Top 75 singles chart in November 1983 but didn’t crack the Top 40 until early January 1984. It reached #1 at the end of January, and remained in the Top 40 for 37 consecutive weeks, 35 of which followed a ban by the BBC, following Radio 1 DJ Mike Read getting his knickers in a twist over what he considered to be some rather fruity lyrics. Halfway through playing the single, Read suddenly turned the record off, denouncing the lyrics as ‘obscene’, an account which Read denies, claiminghe only had a copy of the longer 12″ version in the studio, and that his interruption of the record was purely for timing reasons. Whatever the truth is, he is forever associated with it, credited with instigating the ban which the BBC swiftly enforced shortly afterwards.
The lyrics seem rather tame now – certainly I find it less offensive than Read’s own 2014 single UKIP Calypso, which was rightly criticised for being racist, and which Read subsequently withdrew it from sale and apologised – but back then the words “Relax, don’t do it/When you want to sock it to it/Relax, don’t do it/ When you want to come.” were considered shocking. Head Frankie… Holly Johnson contends that the lyric was misheard: the line wasn’t “When you want to sock it to it”, it was “When you want to suck, chew it”, which I’m not sure helped appease those offended, and I’m pretty sure wasn’t meant to.
The BBC ban wasn’t restricted to the radio waves, but to TV too, which led to the farcical position when it reached #1 where Top of the Pops resorted to simply showing a photo of the band at the culmination of the chart rundown, before airing a performance by a non-number one artist.
When follow-up single Two Tribes followed Relax to #1 a few months later, Relax the single re-entered the Top Ten for a further nine weeks, including two spent at # 2, only kept off the #1 slot for a second time by Two Tribes.
Relax eventually amassed a whopping 70 weeks in the uk Top 100 and sold a reported two million copies in the UK alone, easily ranking among the ten biggest-selling singles in the UK.
By the time this came out in January 1984, Annie Lennox and Dave Stewart were well-established regulars. This was their tenth single, and their fifth to reach the UK Top Ten, peaking at #8.
Eurythimics are one of those bands I’m pretty meh about to be honest. There are some of their singles that I quite liked at the time (only one which I ever purchased), there are some – such as this, and all that had bothered the charts before it – which I hated at the time (the old “no guitars…!!” bias kicking in again) but which I now feel great affection for, and there is one which I hate so much I have to turn the radio off whenever it comes on. Doubtless they will reappear in this series, so I’ll not elaborate further. This is, of course, a painfully transparent attempt to build some tension about which singles I’m referring to.
3. Howard Jones – What is Love?
Second appearance of the 80s synth-pop icon in the series, this was the follow-up to New Song, it fared better in the UK charts than its predecessor, peaking at #2. Jones once said of it: “”I didn’t want to write songs about, ‘I love you, baby, you’ve hurt me and I’m sad.’ I didn’t want to write songs about co-dependency. If I was going to write about love, I wanted to say what do we mean by love? What is it, really? You can’t be dependent upon another person for your happiness. So you’d better question this idea of romantic love pretty soon, otherwise you’re going to be pretty miserable. So that’s really what that song is”, which somehow manages to make it sound even duller than it actually is.
This is more like it, although despite it having a unique and fabulous guitar-riff courtesy of Johnny Marr, I still didn’t buy it at the time because I, sadly, subscribed to the notion that Morrissey was a miserable sod. I took me a few years to finally “get them”, at which point they promptly split up. I don’t believe these two facts are linked.
I caught an old rerun of Top of the Pops on BBC4 the other week, and it kicked off with Sandie Shaw covering Hand in Glove, with The Smiths, sans Morrissey, as her backing band, and I suddenly felt like Seah Hughes used to when The Smiths came on the radio in his sit-com Sean’s Show. I was particularly struck with just how cool Marr looked at the time; no less so when they opened the show with What Difference... (warning, this clip contains image of The Hairy Cornflake and as such should be approached with great caution):
This lot were Scottish one-hit wonders, the band reaching #6 in January 1984 with this one, then never bothering the Top 40 again. The (Feels Like) Heaven line and refrain ws nicked and remodelled to advertise mobile phones back in the late ’90s/early 2000s, the “Feels Like” replaced with the word Carphone, if I remember correctly (and I add that caveat as I cannot 100% remember what product was being advertised, which shows how effective advertising can be).
A song the title of which I recognise, but do I remember the song itself? Nope. I’ve just listened to it. Still, nope.
The band’s keyboard player and song-writer Paul Fishman said the song “… is really about the power of when people come together and express themselves through dancing and letting go. During the ’80s, it was in its very early days but in the latter part of the decade the rave scene was pretty much the message in a nut shell. No, I don’t think people generally understand messages but some get it so that’s alright.” So, that’s him taking credit for the rave scene, whilst calling lovers of pop music thick.
This reached the giddy heights of #28 and then, just like Fiction Factory, their 15 minutes of fame were over.
I should, I suppose, commend the compilers of the Now… albums for not just picking the obvious singles, and trying to include some succesful singles by less well-known acts. Not that they would have known they wouldn’t have continued success at the time, but you get my point.
This was the second of two hits by Dolby, although as I write this I find that the first, She Blinded Me With Science, had been released twice previously, reaching #49 the first time, and #56 the second, so not, strictly speaking, a hit going by my definition (a hit = Top 40).
Hyperactive!, however, managed to get to #17, but nearly wasn’t a Dolby single at all: he initially composed the song for Michael Jackson, following a meeting in 1982, but decided to record it himself when he never got any feedback from Jackson after sending him a demo tape. Maybe if he’d put some pictures of young boys on the cover it might have got his attention.
Hailing from Kirby, near Liverpool, this was the band’s China Crisis 5th single, but the first to bother the Top 40, peaking at #9. More was to come from the band (including two singles I bought at the time, more of them another time, I imagine) but this, I’m surprised to find, was their biggest hit. I say that not because it’s a bad record, but simply because I thought at least one, if not both, of the singles I bought by them were bigger. Wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.
I don’t think that, in March 1984, I really understood how important and great Bowie was, my opinion of him somewhat tempered by my dislike of Let’s Dance, which I remember mocking for the suggestion of putting on red shoes to dance the blues.
I loved Modern Love, though. Not enough to actually buy it, mind, but it went a long way to my recognising that maybe this guy was a genius after all, as did the single sandwiched between it and Let’s Dance, China Girl, which like Modern Love got to #2 in the UK Charts, prevented from hitting the top slot by Culture bloody Club’s Karma sodding Chameleon, which you may recall from the first instalment of this series, I hate. Maybe this goes some way to explaining that.
Yet another that falls into the category of ones by Boy George and the boys that I quite like, and which I can’t think of anything interesting to say about it, other than that it reached #4 in the UK Charts, and that’s not really very interesting at all, is it?
Unlike Bowie, I was very aware of the history and significance of The Stones back in 1984, and this was don to three things: firstly, my brother owned a greatest hits double album called The Story of The Stones, which, of all the Best ofs and Greatest Hits album put out in the band’s name is, for my money, the best one (and when I say ‘for my money’, I meant it, as when I started replenishing my vinyl a few years ago, it was that one which I bought); secondly, some kids at my school put a band together, they performed at a school assembly once, and played Jumpin’ Jack Flash and I thought it was ace; thirdly, as a family we would pick records from my Dad’s collection to play of a Saturday evening, and when the one 7″ single he had by them was selected, my Dad would do a terrible but very funny impression of Jagger along to it. He denied all knowledge of for years, until photographic evidence was finally located and presented to him.
Anyway, Undercover of the Night is no Jumpin’ Jack Flash, but it’s not bad and it did reach #11 and in the UK Charts, and, if memory serves, the accompanying video caused quite a stir at the time, although watching it back now that must have been because of Jagger’s terrible false moustache:
I could have sworn that I owned this, not on 7″ single, but on their 1983 album The Crossing (which I no longer own, I probably flogged it with a load of other records in a moment of madness/skintness); however, on putting this together, I learn that it wasn’t on the album at all, but was released as a stand-alone single in 1984, reaching #8 in the UK Charts. It absolutely sums up Big Country’s signature sound, which is no bad thing in my book.
Given the mention of Simon le Bon in that Viv & Bob/Slade clip, it seems appropriate that this lot appear next. Let’s be honest, though, this, which reached #9 in the UK Charts, isn’t their finest moment, although it has proven to be their most culturally significant, given it has an occasional series on some blog or other named after it.
Another somewhat anti-climactic ending to the compilation, I assume this was placed here to make the songs message of peace more powerful, As with the last two songs, this UK #1 is by no means a classic from Fab Macca Wacky Thumbs Aloft, perhaps best remembered for its video, depicting that moment in World War 1 when peace briefly broke out on Christmas Day, and British and German soldiers put down their weapons and played a game of football in No Man’s Land. Germany won on penalties, I’d imagine.
So, after encouraging you all to share which of these records you bought at the time, it turns out I bought exactly none of them. Ho hum. Maybe next time.
Thank you all for the comments left for me after last week’s first instalment of this series, where I go through all of the tracks on each volume (that I own) of the long-running compilation album series Now That’s What I Call Music.
But you’ll not put me off, oh no. And if you thought, like long-time reader George did, that last week’s serving was “…the worst set of songs I’ve ever read on a blog. Teeth-grindingly bad…” (It’s nice to have such a devoted fanbase), well buckle up because Side 1 of the second disc of Now That’s What I Call Music, where we’re heading today, is, in my opinion, even worse.
Let’s see who wants to admit to having bought any of these back in their more youthful days, shall we?
What did New Edition ever give us? Well, they gave us this utterly irritating UK #1, sung by annoying little pipsqueaks and featuring a horrid squelchy bassline. What else? Well, they also gave us three further UK Top 20 singles; the first, Mr Telephone Man, came two years later, in 1985, and then two more, Hit Me Off [I’m sorry, do what to you, exactly…?] and Something About You but they didn’t scrape the lower regions of the UK Top 20 until 1996 and 1997 respectively, some 13 years after Candy Girl hit the top of the charts. Presumably by then they had all matured into hunky looking young men who danced with their shirts off, or, more likely, in a precursor to the Sugababes’ method of keeping things fresh, an entirely different line-up.
Safe to say, then, that they did not exactly capitalise on their early succeess, and praise be for such small mercies.
But what about in between, in what has become known in Dubious Towers as ‘The No Second Edition Years’? Well, after the follow-up single Popcorn Love [which conjures up horrid images of young men taking their dates to the cinema, buying a massive carton of popcorn, making a hole in the bottom, resting it on their lap and inviting their beau to ‘grab a handful’] limped it’s way to #43, it was followed swiftly – probably more swiftly than their record company had anticipated – by Is This The End to which we as a nation chorused “We fucking hope so!” as we booed it to it’s triumphant peak of #83.
What else did New Edition give us? Well, they also gave us Bobby Brown, and therefore, by extension, dead in a bath tub Whitney .
Here’s the compilers of Now… breaking that well-known rule one should always bear in mind when putting together a mixtape/album/playlist/whatever: Thou shalt not include two tracks by the same artist. Fair play, by the time this came out the Kajas (The GooGoos?) had kicked that prick Limahl out, and lead vocal duties were now taken over by bass player Nick Beggs.
You know how many people’s go-to-reference for awful 80s haircuts is A Flock of Seagulls? Well that overlooks the godawful barnet Beggs had:
Several years later, a mate of mine at Uni inexplicably tried to revive this haircut. He dyed his hair peroxide blonde and then got white hair extenstions put it in. He had them all cut off less than 24 hours later when he got fed up with people baa-ing at him.
Anyway, Big Apple is about life in New York, which is also named The Big Apple. I don’t know how they came up with such a complicated concept to sing about. Imagine: living in a city! In America!!
Ably assisted by Glenn Gregory and Martyn Ware of Heaven 17 fame on backing vocals and production duties, this. a cover of the Al Green classic, was the first of Tina’s great comeback singles. Before this, which reached #6 in 1983, she’d not had a hit in the UK since 1973’s Nutbush City Limits, and that was with her ex-husband and all-round-not-a-nice-guy Ike.
To open the doors on the amnesty of admission: Bless me Father, for I have sinned. It has been one week since my last confession. Whilst I didn’t buy this as a single, I did buy Private Dancer, the album it appears on.
Join me in ‘fessing up via the Comments. It’ll be a laugh, I promise.
Or rather (Keep Feeling) Fascination as the band called it, but the Now… compilers refused to. They probably had a cap on brackets policy in place. And on the number of times they could use the word The on one set of packaging.
Anyway, by April 1983, The Human League were on a roll. This was their 5th Top Ten UK hit in a row, if you ignore The Holiday ’80 EP which re-entered the charts in February 1982, having been originally released in – you guessed it – 1980. This, remember, long before the days of downloading, where 10,000 clicks can get you a #1. No, back then you had to go out and find the record you wanted, flick through the racks of your local vinyl emporium, scour through the ads at the back of the NME to see if you could buy one with a postal order or a cheque. So that re-entry – only at #46, but in the charts for 5 weeks, is indicative of just how massive The League had become.
Or, to put it another way (Dad joke incoming!): it meant Phil Oakey could now afford to get the other side of his hair cut.
For a while in the early-80s, if you wanted a solo male UK pop star, it was either Howard Jones or Nik Kershaw: them’s yer choices. I’ll admit, in time, to buying a couple of Kershaw’s singles, but never anything by Jones. His were just a bit too Casio-toned for my rock-loving ears. And, he had that annoying twat Jed – Roy Jay (look him up) meets Marcel Marceau meets Bez – accompanying him in the videos and TOTP performances for this single:
Oh go on then: Roy Jay. This passed as entertainment in the 80s. Slither!:
No, go on, do make him cry. At least he won’t be singing this interminably dull sub-snoozing reggae then.
And if you’re short of practical ideas about how to make him cry, well a very young Danny Dyer has some suggestions intended for Peter Andre but which I’m sure could easily be transferred over:
Oh Jesus wept. Ordinarily, this sort of schlocky slop would have featured on a smash-hit movie soundtrack, and that would explain how it got to #2 in the UK Charts. I mean: there’s only one explanation for (I’ve Had) The Time of My Life‘s inexplicable popularity: it’s in Dirty Dancing. People – by which I mean, women, like Dirty Dancing. (I’m sure they exist, but I know of no men who like Dirty Dancing. Not any straight ones, anyway.) But Tonight I Celebrate My Love didn’t feature in any blockbuster movie. And back in 1983, just like now, Steve Wright’s Sunday Love Songs wasn’t a thing. So the only place this would get played would be in the last ten minutes at your local disco, when the DJ slllooowwwweedddd tttthhhhhhhiiiiinnnnnnggggsss dowwwwwwwwwwwwwn for ‘all the lovers out there’.
Wake me up when the erection section’s finished will you?
That’s more like it! I’ve written about this, and Tracey’s brief pop career before, here, should you fancy having a read.
Suffice it to say: They Don’t Know is a damn-near perfect pop record. And therefore, I didn’t buy it at the time, though I have subsequently availed myself of a vinyl copy of You Broke My Heart in 17 Places, the album it lives on. Kirtsy MacColl’s original version is probably the song that appears most in my iTunes library. It’s 100% skip-proof: I’ve never gotten tired of hearing it and I doubt I ever will.
Blimey, two absolute crackers in a row. Things are looking up.
Let’s see what wiki has to say about it: “Kissing with Confidence” is a song by Will Powers (the stage name/persona of photographer-turned-singer Lynn Goldsmith) from her 1983 album Dancing for Mental Health. It was written by Goldsmith, Jacob Brackman, Nile Rodgers, Todd Rundgren, and Steve Winwood. Goldsmith used a voice recorder to sound like a man. Carly Simon is the uncredited lead singer”. I mean, c’mon: that’s not a bad set of artists to be working with. Although that voice recorder needs chucking out: I have never for a moment thought it was man providing the central advice on this record.
I’ve posted this before and extolled its’ virtues, and it was met with a decidedly lukewarm reaction. I bloody love it. But of course, I didn’t buy it at the time, although I sponge-like absorbed every word of advice it offered. Y’know…just in case….
Anyway, no, I didn’t buy that, but, I did buy this:
Yes. That’s right. I bought this. In fact, I bought the album, not the single. And I bought the album because it had this on it.
Look. I know we all know what Phil Collins is now. But those were different times, back then. We had no idea how he would turn out. The benefit of hindsight is a wonderful thing. I also had no clue that Genesis used to be some adored arty prog-rock band, fronted by Peter Gabriel dressed as a chrysanthemum; no idea what Collins had converted them from and into.
And you know what? Now I do know, and I’ve listed to Gabriel-era Genesis, and I’d rather listen to Collins-era Genesis than that old shite anyday.
I’m sure they’ll crop up again in this series, if they haven’t already appeared on these pages. There are other Collins/Genesis songs that I like. And when the time comes, I will hold my head up and confess: I. Like. This. Song.
Not now, obviously. I don’t want to expose myself uneccesarily.
There I’ve said it: there are other Collins/Genesis songs that I like. I’m not sure why so many find this such an alien concept. Just because I – we – like the occasional record that someone makes, but dislike them and much of their other recorded output, that does not make me – you – a fan of theirs. That makes me – you – honest enough to give credit where I – you – think credit is due.
The album that has this on it that I bought, the wittily-titled Genesis is, as you would expect, rubbish apart from That’s All.
I mean, this is just magnificent, isn’t it? I didn’t buy it at the time, of course, but fear not! My days of buying Cure records were just around the corner. Redemption is nigh.
I hated Simple Minds back then. I think it was partly because Jim Kerr reminded me of Michael Myers from the Halloween horror movie franchise:
Spot the difference
Anyway, time and age has mellowed me, and I can now appreciate the shimmering magnificence of some of those early Simple Minds records, this one included.
To round off what’s actually turned out to be a pretty decent fourth side, given some of the shite they could have picked, another band making their second appearance on the same compilation album. Tut, tut, compilers.
But having mentioned how much I hate Karma Chameleon last time out, I woudn’t want you to think I was some homophobic twat who hated Culture Club unconditionally because of Boy George. Quite the opposite, I really like Mr O’Dowd, and some of the band’s other singles – Church of the Poisoned Mind, Time (Clock of the Heart), It’s a Miracle, this and…er…well, that’s about it really. So, the ones Helen Terry was involved in, pretty much.
Anyway, that’s it for this week. Hopefully we’re ending things on a positive note this time.
Next time (which should be next week, all being well), we’ll move on to Now That’s What I Call Music Vol II and see what delights that has in store for us, shall we? No peeking!
Many years ago, when I lived in Cardiff, there was an annual free music festival held on the lawn in front of City Hall. It probably still happens, I have no idea, since I’ve not lived there for almost as long as I did live there.
Spread over a Friday, Saturday and Sunday, you’d find a real mish-mash of bands playing. Some up and coming – I saw Super Furry Animals there for the first time back in 1996 – and, to give you some idea of the rich tapestry of acts who performed, The Spice Girls and Pato Banton were also on the bill that year. I know, you’re jealous, right?
Generally, there would be one evening of current music; one of acts with genuine cultural significance, and one slightly cheesy, 80s-centric night. If I tell you that over the years, I saw Chas’n’Dave, Ray Davies, Gene, Fun Lovin’ Criminals and The Proclaimers there (other acts to appear include The Lightning Seeds, Catatonia, The Zutons and Camera Obscura) you’ll get the idea. Bands either on their way up, on their way back down again, or so highly revered that they would light up any night.
The weekend would generally be over-run by lads from The Valleys, agog at city life. You might not know it, but this is exactly what this song is about:
One year, Llŷr and I (and a bunch of friends) gathered together one Friday night to watch the legend that is Howard Jones perform.
Yes. That Howard Jones.
Like me, I’m sure you can maybe remember two or three of his hits from his brief time at the front of British pop music. But this night stayed in mine and Llŷr’s memory for a long time afterwards, for two reasons.
Firstly, because he played a keytar. You know, one of these:
Held like a guitar, played like a keyboard, is there anything which embodies 80s music as succinctly as this?
Secondly, Jones introduced his backing band, and, before announcing their name, he described what turned out to be (another) keyboard player as “on music manipulation!”
Llŷr and I found this hilarious, and from that moment on, whenever at a gig where a band was being introduced, or where we were watching something which just seemed so pompous, so over-blown by its own self-importance, one of us would bellow: “And now…on music manipulation…..!”
As with many of our in-jokes, nobody else would have the slightest clue as to why we were falling about laughing.
Anyway, as the curtain rises on what will hopefully be a better year than the last, this – with Howard on music manipulation! – seems appropriate:
Oh, Come All Ye Faithful, Joyful and Triumphant, come to the Festive edition of The Chain!
I’ve been beset by technical issues this week, not just those which have delayed this by a day, but also the issues with several contributions mysteriously being marked as Spam and disappearing from the Comments section.
But, nevertheless here we are, with another mixed bag of your suggestions, linked to last week’s final record, “Pink Moon” by Nick Drake.
As usual, the suggestions can be split down into various categories – namely songs or artists which include the words or some derivative thereof, of “Nick”, “Drake, “Pink” or “Moon”. Surprisingly, almost none of you suggested anything which contained more than one link, so here’s one to get us started.
From “The Dark Side of the Moon” by Pink Floyd (who have a band member called Nick), here’s:
I set you all an additional challenge last week: since this week’s post would be available in Christmas week, I asked you to see if you could provide suggestions of a festive nature where possible, and some of you duly obliged.
Surprisingly, though, none of you suggested this, a song by a band so un-Christmassy I’ve always found this to be a slightly odd addition to their canon of work, let alone the fact that they released a whole album worth of this stuff:
So, over to you, but where to start? I suppose really, given that he has made more contributions this week than our most regular of readers have made since we started doing this, we should probably hear something from Rol of My Top Ten, right? Agreed.
“Another Nick busy at this time of year is St Nicholas better known as Santa Claus. When another Nick shuffles of this mortal coil he will almost certainly be canonized. Can we have The Man That I’ve Become from Dig My Mood an album by St Nick of Lowe please?”
Is it just me, or does the picture on that sleeve have more than a passing resemblance to a certain orange President-Elect?
CC wasn’t the only person to suggest this particular Nick this week. Here’s Walter from A few good times in my life:
“Taking his first name it is a short step to Nick Lowe. Probably one of the best songwriters in the early 80’s and blessed with a great voice. So what about the first Stiff single ever ‘So It Goes’?”
Regular visitors will know that generally, each week, after I’ve received several suggestions, I get a comment from Alyson from What’s It All About, Alfie? bemoaning the fact that all of the songs she was going to suggest had already been made by co-Chain Gangers. It’s a bit like when the person on the third podium on ‘Pointless’ says that the person on the second podium had just taken their answer. Anyway, so imagine my delight when the very first comment I got this week was from Alyson:
“Time for sleep now, then work tomorrow, so will no doubt be late again with my suggestion…but before CC trumps me, it might involve Lily the Pink.”
Several hours passed. Article 50 was activated and nobody noticed. Civilizations rose and fell. And then, finally, this:
“Well, sleep, work and xmas shopping got in the way so 18 hours after my first comment, I have decided against Lily The Pink by The Scaffold…”
Oh no you don’t. You’re having it, whether you like it or not, young lady:
And since we seem to have stumbled into Pink territory, back to Walter:
“Pink leads me to Pink Flag, Wire’s first record. Three Girl Rhumba was one of these little masterpieces in this era. Groundbreaking and always worth to listen to.”
A few years ago, when I still shared a flat, I did my usual Friday night routine of doing a playlist to get drunk with my flatmates to; it included that Wire rune, followed by the next record. I had neglected to tell my new flatmates that it was a playlist they were listening to; they thought my iPod was incredible for knowing to play these two records together (along with a whole host of other songs which sounded like/had been ripped off (allegedly) from each other. Hmm…maybe there’s a new topic for me there….). What I mean to say is *ahem* *clears throat* *offers a cheeky wink to the audience*…Well, if you’re going to suggest that, then I’m going to suggest this:
Right. I suppose we’d better make some in-roads into this mountain sized pile of suggestions by Rol. Oh hang on, Alyson’s back:
“I have always thought that the multi-talented American singer Pink, and Sharon Watts from Eastenders, were dopplegangers and who did Sharon date for a while on that show – Yes it was “Nick” Berry who had a big hit with Every Loser Wins. (They don’t, every loser generally loses, but it worked well for him). A tenuous double link.”
Much as I’d love to post that, it has featured here before and the rule is that the only records we can feature twice are a) “Back on the Chain Gang” by The Pretenders, and b) records which turn out to be the next record in The Official Chain which we’ve already had. Have another go.
“…perhaps Lily The Pink it will have to be, although just remembered that the brother of Mike McGear of The Scaffold was Paul McCartney whom I also seem to remember recorded a theme for the teatime soap “Crossroads” which Nick Drake’s sister, aforementioned Gabrielle, appeared in. Don’t know if theme tunes count as a suggestion but another double link.”
Well, we’ve featured the theme tune to Bergerac and Space:1999 here before, so I don’t see why not, especially when The Great Gog made reference to the same theme tune via a different link in his suggestion:
“There is Nick’s sister, Gabrielle, who starred in Crossroads at one time. The theme tune to Crossroads was written by Tony Hatch…”
I have had that firmly lodged in my brain ever since I listened to it. It should come with some sort of Government health warning. As should have the programme it book-ended.
“Things hatch from eggs,” continues The Great Gog, “which to me at least is as good an excuse as any for “Egg Shaped Fred” from Mansun.”
Catchphrase alert! Well, if you’re going to suggest that, then I’m going to suggest this, from the magnificent “The Mysterious Production of Eggs” by Andrew Bird:
Right, where were we? Ah yes, Alyson, back to you:
“Final pink suggestion is simply ‘Pink Cadillac’ by Natalie Cole simply because she is yet someone else from that long list of artists who have left us since this time last year.”
It’s probably about time put a dent into Rol’s suggestions. No, really this time.
“I’m resisting the obvious Springsteen link from Alyson’s last suggestion as it’s Christmas and I don’t want to upset George” This would be most admirable, were it not for the fact that Springsteen wrote Pink Cadillac, but I’m sure George appreciates the sentiment.
“However, since no one else will dare suggest a song by the best damned pop star of the last 20 years, can I suggest ‘So What’ by Pink?”
The Chain would like to make it very clear that the views of Rol re: the best pop star of the last 20 years are not necessarily shared by the publishers of The Chain.
There’s something rather wonderful about hearing a seventy-year old Welsh woman proclaiming: “I’m comin’ up so you better you better get this party started”, isn’t there? Bear that in mind when your grannies farting herself to sleep in front of the television on Christmas Day.
Which reminds me: Christmas records, anyone?
Ah, here’s Julian from Music From Magazines, he seems the sort of cheery fellow bound to supply us with something festive. Which he will, but first, he’ll expand a little on the whole Gabrielle Drake thing. She rather seems to have set racing the hearts of several of the men of a certain age who contribute here:
“Nick Drake’s sister was Gabrielle Drake who was in the TV show UFO (any picture would be a Christmas gift for any man of a certain age [See? I told you so]), the heavy metal band UFO is not a gift.”
It’s okay, we’re not having anything by UFO. Although, had you actually suggested something by them, I would have been honour bound to post it. Oh and by the way, I am not posting a picture of Gabrielle Drake. If you’re reading this, you’re already connected to the internet, so you can find one yourself, you mucky sod. ()
Before you all go cranking open a spare browser to do exactly that, stick around folks, because if you piece together this little bit of connected thinking out loud, you get a rather fine example of Comment Showboating.
“On the other hand ‘Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft” by The Carpenters is a fine song written by the Canadian group Klaatu, a bunch of session musicians, who some folk thought were The Beatles.”
I’ve always thought that was a pretty odd, uncharacteristic record for The Carpenters to have recorded, had assumed it was a cover version, but had never actually thought about finding out for sure. Consequently, that’s the first time I’ve ever heard it.
By the way, many years ago, I was drafted into what turned out to be the winning team in a pub quiz. (There was a music round, and without wishing to sound immodest, I was often asked to join teams for pub quizzes which featured a music round). The prize was “A Tribute to The Carpenters”, which I had assumed was going to be a night of people performing cover versions of their many hits, but which actually turned out to be a selection of middle aged men displaying a rather fine range of bureaus and occasional tables they had made.
I digress. Back to Julian:
“A slight detour to the movies for the classic sci fi ‘The Day the Earth Stood Still’ starring Michel Rennie as the alien called ….Klaatu. A still from the film was used (with some editing) for the cover of Ringo Starr’s LP ‘Goodnight Vienna’.”
It’s okay, he’s going somewhere with this. Trust me.
And he’s not wrong you know. The original:
and the “Peace and Love! Peace and Love! No autographs! Peace and Love” rip off:
“Which of course leads on to Dora Bryan and ‘All I Want for Christmas is a Beatle'”
At last, a Christmas record! And am I alone in being reminded of a certain other iconic performer from the North West of England when I hear that? No? You know who I mean, surely?
Julian’s not quite done yet, and we’re most definitely not done with the Gabrielle Drake links just yet. Here’s Julian, ruining all that excellent Comment Showboating by suggesting the Worst Record of the Week:
“Back to Gabrielle Drake. The organisation that [Spoiler alert!! – Considerate Ed] will save the world in UFO is the Supreme Headquarters Alien Defence Organization or SHADO which is only a short step, (or a W) to a truly crap Christmas song”:
“All this talk of Gabrielle Drake being in Crossroads but am I the only one who mainly remembers her from that 1970s Sunday Night drama set in the exciting world of haulage – ‘The Brothers’?” chips in Alyson. “So many links to bands/duos with Brothers in their name so won’t overload you and was really just looking for one that might have done a seasonal ditty but all I could find in my library was Count Basie & The Mills Brothers with ‘December’! (Goodness knows where that came from as can’t remember ever noticing it before.)”
Okay, let’s wrap up the rest of the Drake related suggestions, and we’ll go back to The Great Gog:
“A contender for worst record of the week [Too late, even though you did suggest this first. It is nowhere near as bad as Sir Cliff – Cut’n’Paste Ed]”:
More Drake-related shenanigans from The Beard now:
“Drake is a popular Canadian rapper. Another, much better, Canadian rapper is Abdominal. He is best known for his collaborations with DJ Format. When not hip-hopping Format makes spaced out funk as part of The Simonsound. ‘Tour De Mars’, their cover of Kraftwerk’s Tour De France, is almost as good as the original.”
And the Drake links just keep on coming. Here’s Swiss Adam from Bagging Area:
“Nick Drake was related to Elizabethan sailor, privateer and adventurer, Francis Drake.[Has anyone checked this? – Ed] Francis Drake was a thorn in the side of the ‘King of Spain’, which is a song by Galaxie 500.”
“A drake is a male duck. Chuck Berry was famous for his ‘duck walk’ and he had a song called Havana Moon, first released in 1957, later re-recorded for the 1979 album Rock It. Interestingly, that was the last studio album Chuck released, but he has a new one lined up for 2017, the year he turns 91. Yes – 91. I wonder if he can still do the duck walk?”
I imagine if he can, it would be The Duck Walk sponsored by Stannah Stairlifts and Sanatogen Vital 50+.
Props for the Duck/Drake/Moon double-linker by the way, Rob.
A quick additional duck-link from Walter:
“I don’t think he can’t do the duck walk any more but I’m surprised that he will us give a new record at the age of 91 and I ask myself if Keith Richards will still be on the stage at this age. So Ducks Deluxe came to my mind with Who’s put the bump”
By which I think you mean this (and apologies, I could only find a live version, but it doesn’t sound like there’s many people in the audience, so it’s practically a live studio version):
Whilst we’re on ducks, a song which I remember from my childhood, which I haven’t been able to find a decent copy of, but did find this clip from TOTP2, which means it is top-and-tailed by Steve Wright, which makes it even worse than it already is:
It was around this point that the Comments went all wonky and some got deleted. As far as I can tell, this affected Charity Chic, who compensated by reposting his links over and over again until they worked, and SWC and Badger’s. If anyone else’s got lost, my apologies.
One that didn’t get lost, was this from Kay. In the interest of full disclosure, I should let you all know that Kay is not just a friend of mine, but also my boss, so you’ll forgive me for allowing her suggestions, irrespective of how terrible the record or tenuous the link she suggests. I can say this without fear of retribution because by the time she reads this, she’ll be at least halfway through the bottle of Chocolate Orange liqueur we bought her today. Delicious on Coco Pops, I’m…er…told.
“Nick Drake links to Drake, same name but then realised I didn’t really know any of Drake’s stuff. [I have just Googled him,and I’m none the wiser] So went the same way as The Robster and linked drake to male ducks, then realised I knew no songs that are linked to ducks [It’s going well this, isn’t it?] …. but [I sense a Eureka! moment is imminent] ducks live in ponds and frogs do too…so my choice is Paul McCartney & The Frog Chorus’ ‘We All Stand Together’, which was the first record my sister brought.”
Or, as he is forever known Chez Jez: Fab Macca Wacky Thumbs Aloft. Some of you will understand the reference.
I’m going to avoid the lazy joke about that being Nigel Farage’s least favourite record since it contains a bunch of frogs suggesting unity. Although I appear to have just made it anyway.
By George, it’s George!
“Worst song of the week contender [Nuh-huh]. From Nick Drake to Ted Drake (the footballer) who played for Southampton (and Arsenal)., and was manager of Chelsea when they won their first league title in 1954/55. And born in Southampton, in 1955 (double chain link there!) was Howard Jones. Now, I could it leave it to Charity Chic to pick a Howard Jones track from his record shelves But I’m going for…”
“…which had that bloke in chains prancing around on Top of the Pops. Who was he, anyone know?”
As I said in the Comments, I do. His name was Jed, a name I have been mistakenly called many times, and as such one which is indelibly edged into my brain.
And in case you don’t know who George is on about, here’s Howard and Jed, singing and prancing around on Top of the Pops:
I’m having a flashback, I swear…
Let’s move on to wrapping up the Pink links, and I’ll hand you over to George again:
“Pink Moon to Pink Industry and their single ‘What I Wouldn’t Give’. (The cover of the single featured a picture of Morrissey).”
It does indeed, which is precisely the reason I have a copy of it, poor obsessed fool that I was:
By the way, as I’ve uploaded that I’ve realised that there’s about three minutes of silence at the end of it. Time constraints prevent me from editing it, but I may come back and do it later on, if anyone’s that fussed. What I mean is, when the song sounds like it has ended at around the 3:30 mark, it has: don’t sit around in silence on the off-chance something interesting might be about to happen, as it isn’t.
As I mentioned earlier, the glitches that meant some comments went AWOL seem to have affected Charity Chic, SWC and Badger’s. I think we got there in the end though, although what with SWC and Badger both posting from their excellent When You Can’t Remember Anything blog I’m not 100% sure that I’ve attributed the right song to the right chap this week. So, more apologies if I’ve messed it up.
So, I think this is SWC taking us, as he puts it, “down the pink route” now he’s “finished watching Gabrielle Drake’s finest moment ‘Commuter Husbands’ “
“The obvious link from here is to ‘Snooker Loopy’ by Chas ‘n’ Dave and The Matchroom Mob” which has featured before, so I can’t allow, I’m afraid, “But another song that features pink would be ‘Pink Glove’ by Pulp.”
From vomit to Martini. I don’t just throw this together you know.
Here’s babylotti with a hat-trick, starting with a pink connection, and ending with something festive:
“First of all, I can think of Fuzzbox (had they dropped the ‘We’ve Got a …& We Know How to Use It’ by then?) [Yes and no, is the answer: officially they were now just Fuzzbox, but as this was the first single they released under that moniker, the “We’ve Got…” part was snuck onto the record sleeve just in case there was any doubt as to who was responsible for it. There’d been quite a make over in between the ‘Bostin’ Steve Austin’ album and this, so you can’t really blame them – Ed]) and Pink Sunshine. Bostin’”
“From there that leads me to another one introduced to me by Peel, Fuzzbox’ label mate Ted Chippington. I’d love to go for his version of ‘D.I.S.C.O.’, but I will settle for ‘Rockin with Rita’…”
That’s fortuitous, I haven’t been able to find ‘D.I.S.C.O.’, but ‘Rockin’ with Rita’, no problem:
“Finally from ‘Rockin’ with Rita’, I’m going for a festive link to Mel & Kim’s [no, not those ones, but it’s only a matter of time before they turn up here] ‘Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree’.”
“Moon River is from the excellent 1961 movie Breakfast At Tiffany’s, starring Audrey Hepburn and George Peppard. Ten years earlier, one of Audrey’s first ever screen roles was as a “Cigarette Girl” in the movie Laughter In Paradise in which she appeared alongside another famous George… George Cole. That George would go on to become immortalised as Arfur Daley in the TV show Minder, and in 1983, he would release a Christmas single with his co-star Dennis (“write the theme tune, sing the theme tune”) Waterman.”
I wish I could say I didn’t actually already own this. I think this may over-take Sir Cliff in the Worst Record of the Week stakes:
“Their Top of the Pops performance is worth a watch.” It is, just so you can see the dictionary definition of the words “excrutiating” and “embarrassing” acted out:
It is at this point in the Comments section, that Julian and Rol had a bit of a chat, coming up with more suggestions. Nice to see you boys getting along!
Julian: “Back to the movies, in the film ‘New York New York’ Blue Moon is destroyed by Robert De Niro who costarred in ‘What Happened Next’ (2008) with Bruce Willis……..”
Which leads us to what has been argued to be the greatest Christmas movie ever: Die Hard. (It’s not. It’s pretty much Home Alone for grown-ups.)
The end credits have this festive number playing over them:
And since we’ve landed on some Christmas songs again, here’s another suggestion from Rol:
“Can I add ‘Run With The Fox’ by Chris Squire & Alan White (roughly a quarter of Yes) because it contains a Christmas Moon, which isn’t pink but probably has fairy lights hanging from it. It might keep old proggies like The Swede happy… or not. “
Which I think just leaves us with Badger. Since his comment was one that was lost, I received a summary of both his and SWC’s suggestions. We’ve had SWC’s, here’s Badger’s:
“Nick Drake also recorded ‘Road’ which was covered by scouse punk band Drive on their ‘Out Freakage’ album…”
And this is where it gets complicated. For at the end of their summary of the lost comments, posted by which of our fine friends I know not, was this:
“He also said something about Malcolm McLaren but I true to form can’t remember what.”
Later, this, again, author unconfirmed: “It was to do with ‘Duck Rock’.”
I sought clarification: “Was there a song from ‘Duck Rock’ you had in mind? If not, it’s going to be ‘Double Dutch’…”
The response, again author unconfirmed: “Well most of it is rubbish to be honest [Fair point]. I only thought of it because I saw a copy in a charity shop. Double Dutch is fine.”
But I felt a bit bad about…erm…badgering them into letting me play the track I like the most, so I persevered:
“Yeh, it’s that or ‘Buffalo Girls’ really isn’t? Your call, I have them both lined up ready to go. Which did you suggest in your original lost comment? We should go with that one, really.. “
No response, but to be fair, the boys have probably been swamped with comments and nice things being said about their frankly phenomenal final post (for now…?) over at When You Can’t Remember Anything. If you haven’t read it yet, do your self a favour: click that link and read something incredible. Advanced warning: you will undoubtedly shed a tear.
The reason I was trying to check whether or not one of them had suggested ‘Buffalo Gals’ (as I have subsequenty realised it’s actually called) was this. I never look at what the next record in the Official Chain is until I’ve finished sourcing all the tunes you suggested and thought of a few myself. Seems only fair that we have an even playing field, where I don’t know what the next record in The Chain is any more than you do. Besides, it’d just look plain fishy if I “guessed” right every week.
But when I did look to see what the next record in The Official Chain was, this is what I found:
“From Nick Drake to the following (which is on the ‘Duck Rock’ album)..”:
So, SWC, Badger, jointly as I have no idea which of you suggested Malcolm McLaren, and in honour of your bloody marvellous (please keep going, you’re too good at this to stop) blog, have some bonus points. Merry Christmas.
Okay. So. This is the last edition of The Chain for 2016. I’ll be taking next week off, bar a couple of pre-planned posts I have lined up. Due to the nature of it, I can’t really write The Chain in advance, obviously.
So, you have two weeks to get your suggestions to me, via the Comments section below, for songs which link to “Buffalo Gals” by Malcom McLaren, along with the usual explanation about how you got from record A to record B.
Oh and one more thing. I love doing this, and I’ve said it before and I really mean it – I just host it, the majority of the work is down to you lot and your quite brilliant suggestions. I’ve followed blogs for over ten years now, and I don’t think I’ve ever come across a blog that does what we do here at The Chain. Not me, we.
I cannot think of a single other blog where requests are invited and all are posted; where all is good-natured, pleasant and friendly and everyone accepts they may get a bit of a ribbing every now and then, and nobody objects, nobody trolls, nobody flounces off in a strop because I’ve said their record choice was terrible; where I’ve been introduced to God knows how many songs and artists that I would probably never have heard were we not doing this (and where I hope I’ve returned the favour a few times); and where we get the most incredibly diverse range of artists – just look at that Tag list underneath this!! 46 songs!! Where else would you get that?
What I’m trying to say is this: if you’ve ever made a suggestion here, thank you. You have helped make this place what it is.
Have a very Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year.
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A History of Dubious Taste 