Clandestine Classic XIII - No Lucifer

The thirteenth post in an occasional series that is intended to highlight songs that you might not have heard that I think are excellent - clandestine classics, if you will. Maybe they'll be by bands you've never heard of. Maybe they'll be by more familiar artists, but tracks that were squirelled away on b-sides, unpopular albums, radio sessions or music magazine cover-mounted CDs. Time will, undoubtedly, tell.

Of the twelve songs that have featured in this series before today's offering, eleven come from 1998 or earlier. At least seven of the bands featured have split up too. Clearly I am not down with the kids, as I'm led to believe the saying goes. It is with pleasure then that I can, today, offer something a little more contemporary, and from a band that are not only still plying their trade but are, indeed, at the height of their powers. For today's clandestine classic is No Lucifer, a single from March 2008 by the inestimable British Sea Power.

It's no coincidence that I've just seen British Sea Power live, of course, and this is the song that the crowd were chanting for when the encore started. It's very chantable, you see, including as it does a Big Daddy-referencing call and response of "Easy! Easy!" Anyway... the Brighton-based band (though they're from all over the place) are fronted by brothers Yan and Hamilton Wilkinson, who seem to divvy up the vocal duties between them. Hamilton takes the lead here. They've got a new album out at the moment, Valhalla Dancehall and I suppose I could have been tragically hip and championed a song from that. But excellent though it is, I've gone for a track from their third album instead, the utterly superb Do You Like Rock Music?

Yep, that's right, you heard me. Utterly superb. And, for me, No Lucifer is the standout track. I almost went for the brilliant Waving Flags, which also presses buttons often labelled "epic", but No Lucifer just won out. It's a song that builds from the gentlest of intros into something that drives along, then coasts to let you get your breath back, then drives on some more. It has that chant. And it's a bit of a rabble-rouser, at least in British Sea Power terms - the sort of track that really demands to be played as loudly as possible, insists that you immerse yourself in it. You get the idea - I like this song. Oh, and it has lyrics that don't just verge on surreal but actually make a Dali lobster-telephone seem about as phantasmagoric as an iPhone...

As I've already said, you can find today's clandestine classic on Do You Like Rock Music? and, by the constantly amazing miracle of modern life that is YouTube, watch the (slightly disturbing in places) video too (below). Some say that the unscrupulous among you might find something of interest here but, in that case, you ain't seen me, right? But really, in this case really really, just go and buy the album. You won't regret it. Oh, and you might quite like their pun-worthy British Tea Power merchandise too...