Now I am no longer reliant on my iPod for my musical travel accompaniment, and thus no longer hampered by memory space on it, I’m in the process of going through all of the music I have on my hard drive and uploading it to ‘the cloud’. Essentially this means that I don’t have to be selective anymore, I can just upload everything I have. Stop me if I get to technical.
The other day I found, erroneously moved into a different folder, the file containing every tune that ever featured on a series I used to do called The Chain. Long term visitors will remember it, more recent folk will get the giste: it’s an idea stolen from Mark Radcliffe & Stuart Maconie’s 6Music show, and it’s brilliantly simple. They play a record, and ask listeners to suggest a song which links to it to play next. They pick one, have an on-air chat with whoever suggested it, play it, and then invite suggestions for songs which link to that one. And so on and so on, etc. etc.
Where my version of The Chain differed: I posted every suggestion rather than just picking one. I stopped doing it a couple of times, because it just got too big a task, too time consuming, a chore (for me) rather than being enjoyable. The last edition appeared back in March 2021 – I started writing the next one but it never got finished, and there it has sat in my Drafts ever since, glaring at me whenever I went into that folder, reminding me of former glories, beating like the dead man’s heart in Edgar Allan Poe’s The Tell-Tale Heart:
You can guess where I’m going with this: I’m thinking about bringing it back. Just thinking about it, mind. Don’t get too excited, I’m just contemplating (and sorry if that all sounds rather vain, but I know it was a much enjoyed series).
Anyway, having rediscovered and uploaded The Chain folder, iTunes shuffled tonight’s choice into my ears; it first popped up in The Chain episode #23 (you can still read it if you like, but none of the links work) and was suggested by The Swede from the ever wonderful Unthought of, though, somehow, who said this:
“There’s no way I can pass up such a (ahem) golden opportunity to suggest my favourite song of 2015. From Golden to Silver – ‘Silver John’ by This is the Kit.” (The source tune was Radar Love by Golden Earring, in case you were wondering).
And here’s that very record:
…and this is what I wrote about it in response: “…a band I had no previous knowledge of, and who, on the strength of this song – which musically reminds me of Cowboy Junkies take on “Sweet Jane” from their The Trinity Session album – I’ve gone out and got me the album.”
Funnily enough, when it came up on shuffle, my first thought was that Cowboy Junkies cover, which shows I’m consistent if nothing else. Judge for yourself:
Oh what the heck, here’s the original too:
The Velvet Underground – Sweet Jane
More soon.
A History of Dubious Taste 