Clandestine Classic LXV - Just A Song

The sixty-fifth 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.

Well now, I haven't done one of these since February, and with good reason: how many classics are there, that I rate but you haven't heard of? It gets harder and harder to think of them. But today's song is a corker and, given that it's an album track from 2004, is at risk of being forgotten. It also gives me the chance to lament a band who missed opportunities, made wrong decisions, snatched defeat from the jaws of victory, all of that... so here goes.

It all started so promisingly for Worthing-based four-piece The Ordinary Boys. Any band that takes their name from a Morrissey song has to be worth investigating, right, before you even hear any of the tunes. Then the man himself seemed to endorse them, including the B-side to their second single on a NME cover-mounted CD that he curated. And then there was the fact that singer Samuel preferred to be known only by his surname, Preston. Remind you of anyone?

Musically, The Ordinary Boys were very now, back in 2004/5. They fitted nicely in alongside the sudden plethora of guitar bands that made music for girls to dance to - bands like Franz Ferdinand, The Kaiser Chiefs, The Libertines. They, like these other bands, had a nice line in sing-a-long, chant-like choruses that appealed to the boys whilst the girls were dancing. The future looked rosy.

Debut album Over The Counter Culture sold well enough to make the Top 20 and be certified silver. Follow-up Brassbound did even better, no doubt helped by the single Boys Will Be Boys, a 2-Tonesque song that owed much to The Specials and Madness; it even had a toasted verse by Ranking Junior (son of Ranking Roger from The Beat).

And this is where the wheels started to come off for the band. Somewhere between Boys Will Be Boys' first release and re-release, Preston signed up for Celebrity Big Brother. Now I know I am not young or on-trend or anything else, but in doing this all his hard-earned indie credentials, Moz-endorsement and ska influences got washed down the pan. Gone, in one fell swoop. And not only that, whilst locked in the fabled house he only went and fell for fake celebrity Chantelle Houghton... and married her eight months later... and sold the rights to their wedding to OK! magazine... and separated from her ten months after that. Maybe this is what passes for rock'n'roll behaviour in modern Britain but it's not the trajectory I wanted from my indie heroes. And in-between all that, Preston did himself no favours by walking off-set on Never Mind The Buzzcocks after host Simon Amstell read some extracts from Chantelle's autobiography. Meanwhile, the band were going to rack and ruin, with Preston concentrating more on being Preston than being an Ordinary Boy.

All of which is a shame, because they could really do it. Today's clandestine classic is an atypical offering from their debut album, showcasing arch lyrics, serious subject matter, delicate instrumentation, even a bit of crooning. Witness the opening stanzas:

Oh, to get ahead in this world takes a lot of kind words,
And ruthless damning actions,
And I hope I never have to hurt you, though I gladly will do, my friend.

I'll be reading in the kitchen, sipping lazy cups of tea,
I won't be brooding in my bedroom, with the shutters down on me,
And this song is not cathartic because I've done nothing wrong,
It's just a song...

With lyrics like that, you can see why Morrissey liked them. Indeed, I almost revived the Fantasy Cover Versions series to pitch Moz covering this, but I wanted to write more than that series allows.

Musically, I've just realised this song puts me in mind of late-period Gene. No wonder I like it so much.

Anyway, The Ordinary Boys called time in 2008, reformed in 2011 and have been sporadic ever since. Best to remember them like this though, I reckon, rather than dwell on what might have been.