Elevation

Disclaimer: this post was written in December 2023, and scheduled for future posting. Its contents may no longer be accurate or appropriate.

I've written many times before about the fine margins that often separate a song, or a band, from being great or being also-rans. But what elevates a song, and makes it special? Can it just be one thing?

Ian McCulloch and, by extension Echo and the Bunnymen, grew out of a fertile late-70s Liverpool scene that gave us plenty that made it (Julian Cope and Pete Wylie being two further examples) and plenty that didn't (... er, the fact that I don't have examples illustrates how they have been forgotten). So how thin is the dividing line between being good and being great? Between being transient and lingering in the memory?

Example, you say?

Well, there was a fair amount of guitar-led indie jangle in 1984, much of it confined to the Recycle Bin of the mental hard drive. But Seven Seas doesn't just linger on, it still sounds fantastic. Why? What elevates it? Well, there are some lovely guitar motifs running through it, it has a catchy melody and the artfully odd lyrics help (we've all kissed a tortoise shell, right?) But what really elevates this song, for me, not just above most of the guitar-led indie jangle of the day but also above other Bunnymen output is Ian's understated vocal ululation at the end of each verse (for example, at about 39 seconds in, below).

1984 was a good year for music, and this is right up there with the best of it all. Probably my favourite Bunnymen track too. What's yours?

I wasn't really sure what was going on

Disclaimer: this post was written in December 2023, and scheduled for future posting. Its contents may no longer be accurate or appropriate.

Mother of god, this blog is nineteen years old today. Cue an obvious song. The impact of this, and the accompanying video, on the teenage me is hard to overstate - when this came out, it looked and sounded so completely new and fresh. I even taped the video off the TV (probably Top of the Pops), so I could watch and rewatch it on grainy VHS. It was just so different. Ironic, then, that I post it to celebrate the birthday of something that is basically the same, week in, week out. Whatever. Paul Hardcastle's 19 might have dated a bit, but the video remains powerful.

Unlike this blog, 19 was a global smash, as shown by Wikipedia below. It even did well in the US, despite the subject matter. Or maybe because of.

Not so little now

Disclaimer: this post was written in December 2023, and scheduled for future posting. Its contents may no longer be accurate or appropriate.

Like I need an excuse for a spot of Gene...

Waving flags. Probably a white one.

Disclaimer: this post was written in December 2023, and scheduled for future posting. Its contents may no longer be accurate or appropriate.

Sea Power are playing quite near to me, tonight. They're touring to celebrate the fifteenth anniversary of the album Do You Like Rock Music? which, you might recall, I like so much it's on the Every Home Should Have One masterlist. So naturally I'm going to the gig, right?

Well, I might be, I might not. Because February 14th is not a great date for telling your significant other that you're off out to a gig on your own. "Don't wait up, see you in the morning," all of that ...

So in case I don't make it, this is Waving Flags from that album I boringly drone on about so very often. Put your arm around someone you love and enjoy.

First, last

Disclaimer: this post was written in December 2023, and scheduled for future posting. Its contents may no longer be accurate or appropriate.

I wrote once before (twelve years ago, somehow) about my love of Pulp's album His'n'Hers. It may be an unfashionable view but I prefer it to Different Class, good though that also is. With His'n'Hers, Pulp were getting there but still not massive; they still felt like they belonged to "us" rather than "them". Take the song below, Do You Remember The First Time?, extracted from the album as a single and released in March 1994, whereupon it peaked at number 33 in the chart. A career best for the band, to that point, but hardly setting the world alight, which seems crazy in retrospect: were there really 32 better songs being bought at the time? I'll save you a click, Doop by Doop was #1 that week, which tells you all you need to know (sorry but I'm not linking to that on principle).

Pulp even had a cracking video, though it seems slightly odd now to see Jarvis without glasses.

Fun fact, that (the song, not the video) was produced by Ed Buller, perhaps most famous, at that point, for his knob-twiddling activities with Suede. Anyway, fourteen months after the magnificence of the above, Britpop anthem (© every lazy music journalist, 90s club-night promoter and compilation compiler, ever since) Common People soared to #2 in the charts, and something changed (see what I did there?) But I still remember the first time...

P.S. Another fun fact: Pulp, like The Who, never had a number one single: Common People was held off the top spot by that anodyne cover of Unchained Melody by Robson & Jerome, for crying out loud; almost as hard to believe, double A-side Sorted For E'z and Wizz/Mis-shapes entered the chart at #2 but was held off by Simply Red's Fairground. Chart injustices to rival Joe Dolce...)

Blue Friday: Fuel to Fire

Disclaimer: this post was written in December 2023, and scheduled for future posting. Its contents may no longer be accurate or appropriate.

As I write this, way back in the comparative safety of December '23, series two of the equal parts gripping and annoying drama Vigil is being heavily trailed on BBC1. All of which reminds me of this track, Fuel to Fire, by Agnes Obel, which was used in series one. I don't know anything about Agnes that can't be gleaned from her Wikipedia entry. However, I do know that this track is atmospheric, borderline haunting, and sticks in the mind, especially the simple piano motif throughout the verses. Good video too.

It's too bad we gotta get old

Sadly, but inevitably, I guess, I'm breaking my own sabbatical for another (somewhat belated) RIP post. He might have been in Predator and, for Amusements Minor's generation, The Mandalorian but for me Carl Weathers will always be Apollo Creed. As such, he fills an important part in my personal film-watching history (Rocky was on ITV4 again last night, for the n-hundredth time, so I watched it, for the n-hundredth time). He also provided me with much quotable dialogue, particularly useful in banter with my good friend Tim, for whom the Rocky films are also important.

Here's the closing scene from Rocky III. Yes, it's in a toss-up with V for the worst film in the franchise, but it does have this nice scene, at least. You want to ring the bell, Carl? "Ding, ding..."

Only one of these men looked like a credible heavyweight boxer...

Here's a proper obit for Carl. Just keep punching, Apollo.

Mariachi Brown

Disclaimer: this post was written in December 2023, and scheduled for future posting. Its contents may no longer be accurate or appropriate.

This has been languishing in my YouTube Watch Later list for at least seven years, if not more. It's not going to do either of us any good, is it, just sitting there, so I'd better post it and we can all move on. Here's Mariachi Mexteca (now known as The Mariachis) featuring Hugh Cornwell in their cover of my favourite Stranglers song.