Original Sin

"Dream on white boy

Dream on black girl

And wake up to a brand new day

To find your dreams have washed away..."

I've always had a thing for PROPER rock stars. FRONT men. High kickers, mike stand frottagers, the leather-waistcoat-no-shirt fraternity. Men who can prance down stadium catwalks like coke-eyed gazelles, dampening the crotches of onlookers, unconquerable, hair flailing. I don't want irony. I don't want knowing smirks. I don't want 'Hello Mum. It's me. Your son. It's Robbie'. I want Jim Morrison. I want 'Songs of Faith and Devotion'-era Dave Gahan. And sometimes, most of all, I want Hutchence.

'Original Sin', released in 1983, was written by Michael Hutchence and Andrew Fariss and is one of the great INXS singles. It was a massive hit worldwide - their first Australian number one - and every synthetic snare and tight little guitar lick in it screams 'produced by Nile Rodgers'. A pop match made in heaven.

Andrew Farriss remembers recording with Nile:

"We were fresh off the road. So we had the basic song completed and we'd been playing it live in the set. He was talking to us through the headphones, kind of saying things that were meant to encourage us, and we figured he was just getting levels and stuff on the whole band playing together, but after we'd run it down a couple of times he said 'OK, come in and have a listen'. We went in and the control room was sort of full of people dancing. Apart from adding background vocals [which were by Darryl Hall] and the sax solo, we were finished. We didn't even know he was recording."

Nile Rodgers is doing an In Conversation with Dave Haslam this Friday at the Zion Centre in Manchester. I'll be the one on the front row biting my fist with excitement.

Faster

"I am stronger than Mensa, Miller and Mailer

I spat out Plath and Pinter..."

A fortnight ago, whilst working my second to last ever shift on the counter at Piccadilly Records, I was rendered flustered and giggly by the sudden appearance of James Dean Bradfield and Nicky Wire from Manic Street Preachers. They were in Manchester, it transpired, to perform a secret gig at Night and Day Café. I haven’t listened to the Manics for years, but seeing them up close and personal in the record shop environment made me ponder the influence of their music on my teenage years.

When 'Generation Terrorists' first came out in 1992, I was still, at fourteen, an enthusiastic attendee of my local Free Methodist bible group. I was troubled by all the usual teenage questions about evolution, mortality and morality, and persuaded, for a time, by the adults around me, that the answers could be found, if not in the dense and bloody Old Testament, then certainly in the eminently accessible, and rather funky, New. When, one Sunday, my bible group leader - a not unlikeable lad in his early thirties - pulled out a copy of 'Generation Terrorists' and cited it as an example of all that was wrong and evil in the world, I felt spasms of both shame and excitement. My sister owned the record and we'd been playing it for weeks.

Trying to work out how you really feel about things as a teenager is like starring in your own complex and slightly hallucinogenic detective story. You pull in clues from all manner of sources, to compare, contrast, reject. You believe what you think you ought to until you can't any more. On the one hand I had the fluffy platitudes of Psalm 23 (“The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures; he leads me beside still water”), which made Christianity sound like a really nice day out in The Lakes, and on the other I had the Sylvia Plath quotation from the back of the 'Motorcycle Emptiness' twelve inch: “I talk to God but the sky is empty” - a much more accurate description of what I was actually experiencing.

Thinking that Plath may be able to shed some light on the matter, I went to Waterstone’s one day and picked out 'Ariel', a slim volume - the only one I could afford - and immersed myself in it for weeks. Not the frothiest of reads, it has to be said. And not much help on the God front. But that's what the Manics did. They forced you to investigate. Richey and Nicky spewed out reference points incoherently and indiscriminately, like cultural muck-spreaders, inviting their fans to work it out for themselves. It seemed like they were desperate to tell us something, but what?

Pre-internet it wasn't easy to track down all those writers, those thinkers, those mysterious mind-shapers. Trips to the library were all part of the detective work: “Thus I progressed on the surface of life, in the realm of words, as it were, never in reality.” (Camus/'Love's Sweet Exile' sleeve.)

We got Henry Miller inside the ‘Generation Terrorists’ sleeve: “The tragedy of it is that nobody sees the look of desperation on my face. Thousands and thousands of us, and we're passing one another without a look of recognition.” (I won't forget reading 'Quiet Days In Clichy' under the duvet in a hurry.)

We got Marlon Brando: “The more sensitive you are, the more certain you are to be brutalised, develop scabs, never evolve. Never allow yourself to feel anything, because you always feel too much.” ('Motorcycle Emptiness' sleeve)

We got Ballard: “I wanted to rub the human face in its own vomit and force it to look in the mirror.” ('Mausoleum' sample)

The work of all of these people, and many more, became familiar to me through the Manics. Their music inspired my jubilant descent into atheism and its attendant vices - an experience entirely comparable, I suspect, to being Born Again, and one for which I shall forever be grateful.

(The Manics perform 'Faster' on TOTP - watch out for Vic and Bob)

In terms of actual songs, for me, 'Faster' is the Manics' best – as lean as they ever sounded, stripped of the pop metal excesses of their previous albums, but still angry as fuck. The sample at the beginning is John Hurt in '1984': "I hate purity, I hate goodness, I don't want virtue to exist anywhere. I want everyone corrupt." I love JDB's guitar solo, which pops up unexpectedly in the last minute of the song, so waspish and wonky. In an interview, the band said they'd been listening to Magazine, Wire and Gang of Four. You can tell.

On June 9th 1994, the Manics opened Top Of The Pops with an incendiary performance of 'Faster'. At the time they were wearing a lot of military gear, in tribute, they said, to The Clash. JDB was sporting a paramilitary-style balaclava with JAMES sewn on it. He looked like he'd been working out. Many viewers felt the band were aligning themselves with the IRA. The BBC received 25,000 complaints.

Four months later I saw the boys play Manchester Academy. They'd covered the venue in camouflage netting and were still in their army and navy shop fatigues. They came on to a ricocheting loop of the last phrase in 'Faster': “So damn easy to cave in! Man kills everything!” It was a powerful gig. Loud, mean, genuinely unsettling. Richey was there. Rake thin, of course, naked from the waist up, hanging over his upturned mike stand like the original James Dean in 'Giant'.

Another four months on and he was gone, leaving behind a second ‘Holy Bible’ for me to pore over. With themes including prostitution, American consumerism, fascism, the Holocaust, self-starvation and suicide, it proved only slightly less punishing than the first.

Hungry Heart

"I took a wrong turn and I never came back..."

Last night I was working with one of my favourite bartenders, Abby- a vision in hi-sheen leggings and heels - who keeps me going through the red-eye shifts with her encouraging grins and impassioned requests ("I fucking love Foreigner!"). She has a large autograph-style tattoo on her forearm that reads You Can't Start A Fire Without A Spark. Needless to say, she is an absolute Springsteen die-hard.

To be honest, I barely noticed The Boss until recently. Yeah, there's this earnest bloke who has forged an entire career out of sweating profusely in a lumberjack shirt. Yep, his song 'Born In The U.S.A.' was misunderstood the world over. Yeah, he made a rekkid called 'Nebraska' but who gives a shit? I couldn't even be frigged to shamble past the Pyramid stage during his fourteen-hour set at Glastonbury.

But then I remembered 'Hungry Heart'. I don't know why I know that track so well. Originally released in 1980, it was re-issued in '95, which must have been one of those I-have-absolutely-nothing-in-my-life-apart-from-the-Top-40 years. It's got a Motown-style tom/snare/tom intro fill that I adore (an almost identical one can be heard at the beginning of Charles and Eddie's 'Would I Lie To You?') and is as predictable as pie from thereon in. Make no mistake, we all know every turn 'Hungry Heart' is going to take before Bruce even gets behind behind the wheel. But fuck, fuck, FUCK, it's good. From that virile howl in the opening moments (YEAAH!) to the horribly optimistic jump to E flat for the organ solo, this song says: why let a ransacked heart stop you punching the doggone air?

The first time I played it out at the aforementioned bar something strange happened. There was an audible whoop of recognition from the crowd and then people started getting up on tables. Seriously. The whole night moved up a gear. I could hear the joyous sound of punters singing over the system. A middle-aged man pushed his way through the mêlée, sweating as though in tribute to The Boss himself, and bawled, "I haven't heard this record out for twenty years, love! Right, guess how many times I've seen him play? Guess. No. Guess. Guess! Thirty-bleedin'-two. Thirty two times, I've seen him, yeah." * Then Abby shimmied over with a brimming pint to exacerbate my bafflement and told me the song was originally written for The Ramones in '79.

A later glance at Wikipedia revealed this was indeed the case. Apparently, Jon Landau, Springsteen's manager, put paid to the collaboration back then - he was still sore about 'Because The Night' going to Patti Smith. John Lennon was said to be a fan of the song, commenting on the day of his death (allegedly) that it reminded him of 'Just Like (Startin'Over)'.

A last tune of mine for a while now, 'Hungry Heart' has taken on the quality of a melancholy TV theme. Time at the bar, credits rolling, the end. It's often ringing in my ears as I fight for a taxi, or wait, impatiently, for sleep. I got bossed in the end.

Funny ol' game.

*For film buffs, this incident was oddly reminiscent of Fred Willard's 'bench press' scene in 'Best In Show'.

Virginia Plain (Headman Re-Work)

"Havana sound we're trying hard edge the hipster jiving
Last picture show's down the drive-in..."

Always had a soft spot for this Headman re-work, which seems to take its inspiration from Roxy's unforgettable 1972 TOTP performance. Sadly, my lovely 180 gram seven inch is as warped as a David Lynch screening in an Early Learning Centre.

:-(

Ghost Trains

"A plane made of paper

Struck by the light

Circled forever

Over the city at night

Like a movie

Like a song

How it should be

Being young..."

An exercise in space and restraint, a pretty desolate record. Track one on a compilation I'm putting together of songs to listen to on railway platforms at dusk. Morgan Geist on the knobs and faders.

You Just Haven't Earned It Yet, Baby (Extended)

"Today I am remembering the time

When they pulled me back and held me down

And looked me in the eyes and said,

You just haven't earned it yet, baby..."

A rare version of Kirsty's Smiths cover (released as the B-Side to 'Free World' and for the 'She's Having A Baby' OST). It includes an extra verse at the start.

I love the way Kirsty's dazzling harmonies dance effortlessly around Johnny Marr's riffs in the climactic multi-layered outro (2:40 onwards).

Marr once described Kirsty as having "the wit of Ray Davies and the harmonic invention of the Beach Boys. Only cooler."

Station to Station

"It's not the side effects of the cocaine

I'm thinking that it must be love..."

'Station to Station'. It's so good, I almost don't want to talk about it. Like a dark but pleasurable secret that you strain to keep, or a slowly spreading bruise that you can't stop pressing, it's hard to resist the ominous plod of those opening seconds. The distant whistle of a train, the sound of Earl Slick torturing his guitar with an E-bow. This is how The Thin White Duke is introduced. And when he finally does sing, the words just leak out of him. Malevolent, exhausted, horny. I am often reminded of an Angie Bowie quote I read years ago: "The guy could poke a hole in a wall".

'Station to Station', at 10:14, is the longest track in the Bowie catalogue, but it's too artfully structured to ever get boring or indulgent. The band, Dennis Davis (Roy Ayers' drummer), George Murray (bass) and Carlos Alomar (rhythm guitar), are masterful at bringing order, movement and punctuation to Bowie's flights of fancy. So, at 5:17, just as our heartbeats are beginning to slow, a typically delicious tom fill announces the second, more uptempo section of the song. I love that refrain, 'It's too late to be hateful! It's too late to be late again!' and the edge of hysteria that creeps into Bowie's voice when he sings it. So much going on. The post-'Young Americans' locked-in funk, Roy Bittan's E-Street-style bar room piano, Earl and Carlos: fretboards at dawn. And poor Dave, losing his grip on reality, surviving on 'red peppers, cocaine and milk', frightened of his own stage creation - 'a hollow man who sings songs of romance with an agonised intensity while feeling nothing'. Quite a melting pot.

There have been a few Bowie covers flying around recently that have pricked up my ears. First there was the Mascara version of 'Golden Years' from 1979, dug out and re-issued on a seven by Homophono. Next there was the slightly pointless David Bowie vs KCRW 12" of 'Golden Years' remixes, and then, more recently, there was the Tobor Experiment cover of 'Station To Station'. None hold a candle to the Duke himself, of course, but I like the way Giorgio Sancristoforo has reworked 'Station to Station'. You can feel his love for the song. It's a pretty rendition, wistful and vibey and sung in a strong Italian accent.

But maybe you're best sticking with the 3xLP, 5xCD box set re-issue of the 'Station to Station' album itself - a 'fantastic voyage' of bootlegs and remasters, all yours for the price of two grams of Peruvian flake, and no nosebleed in the morning.

Slow (Extended Mix)

"You know what I'm saying

And I haven't said a thing

Keep the record playing..."

Bursting out of my speakers on this mercifully sunny afternoon, Kylie Minogue's 'Slow' sounds every bit as seductive and extreme as it did on its release date eight years ago this November. A peerless pop production then and now, 'Slow' was masterminded by engineer Dan Carey (The Kills, Hot Chip), Icelandic singer Emiliana Torrini and, of course, the former Ms Charlene Mitchell herself.

As with lots of the landmark pop tracks I blog about, I can remember the first time I heard it - after hours in the basement of the record shop where I worked, the extended mix played off a white label. It wound its way around me, gave me no choice. It's one of those records that draws the listener in with what it leaves out. A real statement.

Tricky to pull off live (in my view), 'Slow' is all about the studio. It's a lesson in stealth and minimalism: the dryest of dry rhythm tracks, the merest hint of a synth riff, that four-note bassline - simplicity itself. Then there's Kylie, of course, all close-miked and conspiratorial, murmuring something rather promising about her 'body language'.

It's testament to the quality of the production that Michael Mayer, co-owner of Cologne's famed techno label Kompakt, was moved to cover 'Slow' in 2005. But even he could not compete with the purity of the original. His version didn't really work. Why?

Because Kylie wasn't on it.

'Slow', for me, belongs at the centre of an imagined 'Venn Diagram of Ace Pop': the place where the experiments and extremities of the underground collide with the lavish sex appeal, star quality and accessibility of the mainstream. It's one of my favourite places to spend time. Click here, here or here for more details.

Baillie Walsh, director of the 'Slow' video, contributed further to the atmosphere of the track with his highly stylised aerially shot film of poolside bathers shifting on their towels in mellifluous synchrony. Kylie's right where she should be, working it at the centre, 'best dress on' (just).

Saturday 27th August - The Deaf Institute

POP! IN THE NAME OF LOVE

August Bank Holiday's Pop 'Til You Drop sees Danielle Moore (Crazy P) and Abigail Ward (Fist of Pop) return to the Music Hall for another night of classy pop decadence under the mirror ball, whilst downstairs Pasta Paul serves up a fresh pan of al dente indie and future pop, washed down with cheap Absolut cocktails.

Firm, but not hard.

28 August 2011

10pm-3am

The Deaf Institute

135 Grosvenor Street

Manchester, United Kingdom

£5.00 in::: 10pm - 3am ::: all three floors

Slow Pop for Sultry Nights - A Mix

I really enjoyed playing the bar at Pop 'Til You Drop last Saturday. It was great to dig through all my slow jams and extended mixes. Here's a little blend of some of the stuff I chose.

For Steven, forever in his dressing gown...

Listen above or download here.

01. The Korgis - Everbody's Got To Learn Sometimes (Instrumental)

02. Yello - Of Course I'm Lying

03. Dusty Springfield - Nothing Has Been Proved (Dance Mix)

04. Sade - No Ordinary Love (Full Length Version)

05. The Eagles - I Can't Tell You Why

06. The Mythical Beasts - Communicate

07. Maxwell - Everwanting: To Want You To Want

08. Rossoulano - Friends In Lo PLaces

09. Lalomie Washburn - Try My Love

10. Kylie Minogue - Confide In Me

11. Feist - One Evening

12. Bryan Ferry - Which Way To Turn

13. The Flaming Lips - Sleeping On The Roof

14. Marvin Gaye - Sexual Healing (Alternate 12" Instrumental)

No Ordinary Love

"I gave you all the love I got

I gave you more than I could give..."

Pop 'Til You Drop, sultry summer warm-up vibes.

This is dedicated to anyone who'd forgotten that once, many years ago, there lived a beautiful mermaid called Helen Folasade Adu.

She wrote lots of great songs about cool guys and sold over fifty million records.

In the late nineties, following a career hiatus, rumours abounded that the notoriously private songstress had a heroin habit.

I doubt any hit, however pure, could ever be as good as 'No Ordinary Love'.

Amy Winehouse 1983 - 2011

"We only said goodbye with words...."

I used to love watching Popworld on a Sunday morning - the Simon and Mikita years - early on when Amstell was still playing by the rules, but only just. I remember seeing an interview with newcomer Amy Winehouse. She was charming (that accent!), still quite curvaceous and tattoo-free. I took to her immediately and bought the debut album, but as she admitted herself, it was 'only 80% there'.

When I first saw the video for 'Rehab' featuring the Dap-Kings gamely jamming along in their pyjamas I knew she'd cracked it. I played the 'Back To Black' album to death that year (2006), and it's not left my DJ bag for long since. It's interesting to look at the writing credits for both records. 'Frank' is co-written for the most part, with multiple contributors, in what looks like a 'write a word/take a third' vibe, but by 'Back To Black' Amy had seized control as principal songwriter. It annoys me that so few people seem to comment on how striking and vivid her lyricism was. That line, he left no time to regret/kept his dick wet/with his same old safe bet, gets me every time. Whilst I'm fond of Sharon Jones's work with the Dap-Kings, there isn't a song in her entire back catalogue that contains a couplet like that.

Another thing about 'Back To Black' is Amy's phrasing. I love the way she leans on the timing on we only *said* goodbye with words. She must have been, what? twenty-two, three when she was recording that. I can think of plenty of jazz legends that didn't reach that level of weary couldn't-give-a-fuck-ness 'til their forties.

The Winehouse sense of humour was as underrated as her lyricism. There was the moment in a later Popworld broadcast when footage of Lesley Joseph in 'Birds of A Feather' was interspersed with Amy shouting 'MUUUUUUUUM!' . Or her description of the work of Dido as 'the background music to a death' springs to mind.

I saw Amy play at the Academy in '07. It was fantastic. I also saw her at Glastonbury the same year. I can remember getting myself a good spot, all zipped up in my waterproofs with just my trusty hip flask for company, rain drops dripping off the end of my nose. As soon as she hit the stage her unique presence and warmth enveloped me as persuasively as the whisky. A real Glasto moment.

'So now the final frame'.

R.I.P.

Jam

"We must live each day like it's the last..."

On July 30th - the date of our next Pop 'Til You Drop party - it will be exactly nineteen years since I saw Michael Jackson perform at Wembley Stadium as part of his 'Dangerous' tour.

The memories are indelible. It was an incredibly hot day. My friend fainted and I was sick before MJ even came on, due in no small part, I'm sure, to the double-whammy assault of support acts Kriss Kross and Rozalla.

Michael's characteristically muted entrance involved him being catapulted upwards out of a trapdoor centre-stage, following a blast of 'Carmina Burana'. He stood motionless for some minutes (too many, I remember thinking) while we all screamed our throats raw. And then 'Jam' kicked in. Teddy Riley's granite-hard beats were like blows to my vital organs.

The rap in 'Jam' is performed by Heavy D, who, Wikipedia informs me, is now a 'reggae-fusion' artist. Rap middle eights, especially very poor ones, are a source of fascination to me - my Mastermind subject, if you like. So those attending on the 30th would be advised to brace themselves if I am spotted picking up the mike. To complete the tribute I will also be leaving the stage at Deaf by jet pack, via a skylight, dressed as an astronaut. Go with it! Go with it! Jam!

TVC15

"I brought my baby home,
She sat around forlorn..."

Watch TOTP dance troupe Ruby Flipper wrapping their legs round Bowie's 'TVC15'.

Incredible shenanigans.

Taken from the amazing One For The Dads blog.

Thanks, as always, to the eagle-eyed JSZ.

Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep

Whilst I will always be a pop kid at heart, I have a strong dislike for excessively chirpy records. As an insomniac, I frequently find myself tormented by certain tunes that seem to squat in my brain and thumb their noses at me all night, relenting only when that ultimate of chirpy taunts – the dawn chorus – begins.

In an attempt to exorcise some of these smug ditties (that’s what they are: ditties), I hauled myself up at 4am yesterday morning and wrote a list. Here are ten tracks that have an unacceptable chirp-to-tune ratio. They will never be played at Pop ‘Til You Drop. They are the musical equivalent of someone tapping you urgently on the shoulder for twelve hours, and then shouting ‘NOTHING!’ when you finally turn around.

1. Maria Muldaur – Midnight At The Oasis

2. Jim Noir – Eany Meany

3. Jon Cutler featuring E-Man – It’s Yours

4. The Velvet Underground – I’m Sticking With You

5. Peter, Bjorn and John – Young Folks

6. Luther Vandross & Janet Jackson –

The Best Things In Life Are Free

7. OutKast – Hey Ya!

8. Len - Steal My Sunshine

9. Joni Mitchell – Big Yellow Taxi

10. Presidents of the United States of America – Peaches

SEND YOUR FUCKING CAMEL TO BED.

Love Will Save The Day

"When you're feeling full of doubt

And fear has got you in a bind

Love will save the day..."

I have done my best throughout my life to avoid the work of Whitney Houston. That never-ending winter of 1992 still casts a shadow. There was I, fifteen years old, miserable, watching ‘I Will Always Love You’ on The Chart Show for the umpteenth week, just yearning for something (anything) else to hit the number one spot. And there was Whitney, splay-legged, hands in that saintly clasp, wobbling her jaw to achieve maximum vibrato… God, she made me want to slash my armpits with boredom. No wonder records like this sounded so good.

But recent events have forced me to re-evaluate one tiny section of the Twitney back catalogue. At the second Pop ‘Til You Drop back in April, my partner in crime DJ Danielle Moore dropped ‘Love Will Save The Day’. I had just wedged myself into the toilet and was happily adding to the graffiti (I <3 Shep Pettibone) when the disquieting realisation that I was enjoying a Whitney Houston record hit me. Then, seconds later, lettuce barely shaken, I found myself careering around the dancefloor like an inebriated farmhand whilst paying customers looked on aghast.

By coincidence, last Monday evening, during an extravagantly lubricated Spotify session here at Pop Heights, ‘Love Will Save The Day’ surfaced again, confirming my suspicion that the tune is a wig-lifting, wab-wobbling, gusset-splitting anthem of titanic proportions, in spite of its cloying ‘message’.

The next day, after a couple of light ales, I was persuaded by my Whitney-loving friend to investigate the White Vest album further. One fraught listen off cassette on a car stereo, during which I left bite marks on my own fist, revealed there is little else on there for the taking. Whitney’s version of ‘I Know Him So Well’, performed with her mother (somewhat inappropriately), sounds like two car alarms arguing in an empty turbine hall. ‘Didn’t We Almost Have It All’ is another wallpaper-stripping ballad that Ms. Houston approaches with all the subtlety and restraint of a newly promoted Drill Sergeant. The whole album is plastered in the kind of electric piano that makes you feel like you’re having the contents of a Cadbury’s Creme Egg squeezed into your earhole as you listen. It really does make a girl want to smoke crack.

Which I almost did, back in 1993, when eventually Whitney was knocked off her perch by this:

A punishing year for pop music ensued.

Let There Be Music

The 'Let's Change The World With Music' album was composed and recorded in demo form back in 1992, but rejected by Prefab Sprout's record label. This release is actually Paddy McAloon's original demo, performed entirely by him back in '92, but slightly remastered by Calum Malcolm in 2009.

'Let There Be Music' is a Pop 'Til You Drop early doors statement of intent.

See you on the dancefloor!

When I'm With You

When I get drunk, I have a tendency to hold interminable pub conferences about what makes a good love song. My list of favourites is several miles long, but I often come back to 'When I'm With You' by Sparks for its strange accuracy and lightness of touch.

The track was produced by Giorgio Moroder and Harold Faltermeyer and is taken from the superbly titled 'Terminal Jive' album from 1980.

And if the video doesn't give you the raging horn, you're dead from the waist down.

"When I'm with you

I never have a problem when I'm with you

I'm really well-adjusted

When I'm with you

When I'm with you

I lose a lot of sleep when I'm with you

I meet a lot of people

When I'm with you

It's the break in the song

When I should say something special

But the pressure is on and I can't make up nothing special

Not when I'm with you

When I'm with you

I never feel like garbage when I'm with you

I almost feel normal

When I'm with you

When I'm with you

I'm always hot and bothered when I'm with you

I always need a shower

When I'm with you

It's the break in the song

When I should say something special

But the pressure is on and I can't make up nothing special

Not when I'm with you

When I'm with you

I never need a mirror when I'm with you

I don't care what I look like

When I'm with you"

Reach For Love

"I freeze, baby,

At the thought of leaving you behind..."

The question I least like being asked when I am DJing is:

“Are you the DJ?”

Closely followed by:

“Whenyer gunner play some Manchester stuff?”

But over the years I have developed coping mechanisms for both. For the first I have an affronted and unyielding Ron Mael-esque stare that says, ‘If you come near me again I will pin your scrotum to this turntable and then press start.’

For the second I have Marcel King.

What a record.

I first came across the amazing ‘N.Y. mix’ of ‘Reach For Love’ on an American blog years ago, and after perusing Discogs was surprised to discover the track came out on Factory Benelux in 1984. It was produced by New Order’s Bernard Sumner and Donald Johnson of ACR – Manchester’s all-time *heaviest* drummer. Apparently, this collaboration came about after New Order manager Rob Gretton – a massive soul head, of course – found Marcel sleeping rough in the back of a car. I’m not sure how much truth there is in this rumour.

Rob would have known Marcel from his tenure as front man for Sweet Sensation – the eight-piece Philly-style Manchester soul group that won the talent show New Faces in 1973 and had a hit with ‘Sad Sweet Dreamer’.

‘Reach For Love’ is one of those records that never leaves my DJ bag. It’s like an old mate that can be relied upon to boot you smartly up the arse, buy you a pint and haul you onto the dancefloor when you need it most. Marcel’s vocal is something else: euphoric and yet easy-going, with just a tantalising hint of remonstration on those “I’ve been trying to show you a better way” lines. The production still sounds killer – even on shit café soundsystems. You have to be careful at what point you drop ‘Reach For Love’, though, because it can flatten other records with its knock-out punch.

Tragically, Marcel King died of a cerebral haemorrhage in 1995, aged just 38.

R.I.P, sir. You fucking rocked.

Juxtapozed With U

"I'm not in love with you

But I won't hold that against you..."

Whilst here at Pop Heights we do occasionally suffer from a touch of vocoder-fatigue, we never tire of 'Juxtaposed With U'.

According to Wikipedia, the song was inspired by 'Ebony and Ivory'(!) as well as the work of Marvin Gaye and Caetano Veloso. The track was originally conceived as a duet, with the band approaching both Brian Harvey (from East 17) and Bobby Brown to sing alongside Gruff Rhys. Both turned the band down, so Rhys sang the verses through a vocoder to imitate another person, something which he described later as a "very schizophrenic thing to do".

Union City Blue

"Tunnel to the other side

It becomes daylight

I say he's mine..."

How can a track like 'Union City Blue' - essentially a pop song with no discernible chorus - be so stirring, panoramic and unforgettable? Really, it's just several verses strung together in a rather humdrum cycle, and yet it is one of the strongest songs in the Blondie catalogue. It's so free-flowing and airy it sounds as though it took Debbie Harry and bassist Nigel Harrison (a Stockport lad, by the way) mere seconds to jam out. They obviously had the confidence to just let it fly. All power to them for not structuring the life out of it.

I find the track evocative of my teenage years in Preston. I used to blast it out in my ten-foot by ten-foot bedsit, often in an attempt to mask the sounds of the middle-aged man in the room opposite shagging his alsatian. The song personified everything I longed for at that point: escape; enterprise; the sheer glamour and scale of city life. All those words Harry throws at the listener - Skyline! Passion! Power! How they reeled me in.

I went to see Blondie in 2000. It wasn't an amazing experience, but it was one I thought I'd never have. Chris Stein looked so frail and ill he gave the impression of being propped up and operated from behind by a complex pulley system. Debbie was throwing herself around like a pissed grandma on a bouncy castle to compensate. But when Clem Burke started slamming out the tom tom intro of 'Union City Blue', I nearly pissed myself with excitement. He looked and sounded perfect.

'Union City Blue' is as much Clem's song as it is Nigel and Debbie's. The end of the track is as heart-stopping as the opening. For almost the whole of the last minute, Clem is smashing the shit out of every cymbal available. Few other pop producers would countenance such a relentless hammering of splash, ride and crash, but Mike Chapman knew better than to argue. Pure exhilaration.

On a final note, I have always noticed that, live, Debbie Harry tends to sing "powder" rather than "power". I'm not entirely sure what this might be a reference to...

(Starts 3:45 minutes in.)

Freebirds

"Freebirds fly away

They just don't stay..."

Picked this up on a chunky little seven at the weekend. It has everything I need from a pop song at the moment: sleek production, soothingly predictable chord changes that you can sink into like a hot bath, and a desolate vocal about losing a lover to that ol' homebreaker 'freedom'.

Nice video too.

Lover Lover are Eleanor Bodenham and Martin Craft (M. Craft, Jarvis Cocker) with producer Nick Littlemore (Empire of the Sun).

You can hear an acoustic version here:

Lover Lover - Freebirds Acoustic by Cross Keys Records

http://www.piccadillyrecords.com/products/LoverLover-Freebirds-CrossKeysRecords-76286.html

Wanna Be Startin' Somethin'?

The next Pop 'Til You Drop party is Saturday May 28th at The Deaf Institute, Manchester.

With DJs:

Abigail Ward (Fist of Pop)

Neil Scott (El Diablo’s Social Club)

Pasta Paul (Piccadilly Records)

SET IT OFF!

Bernard Edwards R.I.P.

It’s fifteen years ago today since Bard of the Bass and all-round rapper’s delight, Bernard Edwards, died of pneumonia following a gig with Chic in Tokyo. He had reportedly mentioned to bandmate Nile Rodgers that he was feeling unwell, but couldn't be persuaded to cancel the concert. Nile found him dead in his hotel room only hours later.

There are a great many ‘Nard moments to rave on about, but I will always be particularly transported by his solo in ‘Le Freak’ (the extended mix). This is ‘Nard centre-stage, nailing it down with minimum sweat and maximum poise. Who else could play the same riff for over a minute and make it sound so spellbinding? I love those dizzying, ever-ascending strings that swirl around him like a blizzard, and also the layered handclaps that appear just as you're about to burst with anticipation for the chorus. When he drops that little slide in at 3.47, it’s almost like an exclamation mark (fuck!) and a quick gasp of breath before his outro lick and then we’re back in. Sexual.

Apparently, when he was starting out, ‘Nard used to drop his plectrum all the time, so he developed a technique (nicknamed ‘chucking’) that involved using his fingernail as though it were a pick. This meant, unusually, that ‘Nard’s downstrokes had the brightness and attack of a picked note, whilst his upstrokes had the warmth of a thumbed note. This unique hard/soft combination is perhaps best illustrated on the jaw-dropping intro to ‘Everybody Dance’.

Why not give it a whirl at home?

I'm Going Slightly Mad

Want.

Oh! Darling

"Believe me when I tell you

I'll never do you no harm..."

Over the years I have met many boring people in pubs who have opined, after their third pint of Too Familiar, that Paul McCartney's songs are 'less emotional' than John Lennon's due to Paul's supposed love of musical pastiche and the occasional Vaudevillian curlicue.

I usually greet these claims with a massive yawn.

'Oh! Darling' is about as raw (roar?) as it gets for me. I don't think there are many singers who could divide just one word - 'died' at 1.37 - into two such distinct halves: the first a Little Richard-esque squall, the second a wounded, boyish plea.

Paul experimented with a lot of vocal takes for this track over a number of weeks. Apparently, he would try it only once a day, believing the final version should be a first take. The unused Take 26 didn't make it onto the anthologies, but has been knocking around for years and gives us access to a very different performance - all soft and tremulous (or shot, maybe) on the second chorus. Fucking phwooargh.

Anuses like me may have noticed a slight bass fluff or edit on the finished version at 0.52, which you can hear clearly by panning the balance on your amp hard right. This will also expose George Harrison's sneering chorus lead in all its glory. I love that riff - so dry, stark as fuck, satisfyingly nasty, almost like the Telecaster equivalent of Herrmann's 'Psycho' stabs.

One thing that will always grieve me; however, is that 'Oh! Darling' is followed by 'Octopus's Garden'. Surely the sequencing equivalent of a whoopee cushion at a funeral.

John Lennon said:

"'Oh! Darling' was a great one of Paul's that he didn't sing too well. I always thought I could have done it better—it was more my style than his. "

Wanker.

Does Your Mother Know That You're Out?

"I'm the cruiser

You're the loser

Me and you sir?

Homosapien too..."

"Well I can dance with you honey

If you think it's funny

But does your mother know that you're out?"

We don't have a high tolerance for mash-ups here at Pop Heights, but try sitting through this one with a po-face.

Thanks, Tony.

Living In Another World

"Did I see tenderness where you saw hell?”

I can remember the first time I heard ‘The Colour of Spring’. It’s just one of those albums. The sun was streaming through the windows of the record shop I worked in, revealing dust motes in the air and grime everywhere. I fell pretty hard for the whole LP, but ‘Living In Another World’ took a while to grow. Maybe it’s my favourite now.

It’s a fascinatingly structured track. I love the way the chorus suddenly jumps out, unannounced – a kind of ambush. Then we get Mark Feltham’s searing post-chorus harmonica riff. Fresh momentum is achieved in the second verse via the introduction of an ace one-note anchoring bassline. By this point, Mark Hollis is sounding increasingly desperate. When he delivers the pay-off line, “God only knows what kind of tale you’d tell!”, I have visions of him in the vocal booth ripping fistfuls of hair out. His post-break-up lyric seems to deal not with the sadness of heartbreak, but with the rage and mystification of it.

At 3.37 a petulantly mis-hit piano chord announces a fifteen second percussive break. I always find myself waiting tensely for those four snare cracks that signal the song’s resumption. Great fill.

Driving the track along throughout is a feverish Hammond part by Steve Winwood. Legend has it the starstruck Talk Talk boys were so thrilled to be working with Winwood they decided furtively to note down the settings of his organ drawbars for future use in the studio. They were amused to discover he had literally pulled out all the stops…to the max. Voila: The Winwood Sound.

The extended twelve inch of ‘Living in Another World’ lacks the jolting urgency of the album version, but is a brilliant arrangement in its own right.

Thank you to my friend James for making me listen to Talk Talk, despite my hatred of their artwork.

Song 4 Mutya

"I'm driving fast, I feel so fine

I've got Prince singing 'Hot Thing' to me

I know every line

So I pull up to the red light

Sitting there in my car

I look up to my right

And there you are

Sat there with some new girl - what is this?

That's who has replaced me - what a diss!"

Normally, the music of Groove Armada makes me shiver with a nameless dread, but I went a bundle on this collaboration with ex-Sugababe Mutya Buena in 2007.

There's something about the way she narrates those opening lines that tickles and terrifies me in equal measure. Maybe it's because she looks a lot like a girl I went to school with who gave me a deserved whalloping once for "using big words". I definitely wouldn't fuck with Mutya. I bet what she has done to toilet attendants in clubs over the years would send Cheryl Cole running for her mummy.

The groove of 'Song 4 Mutya' is a replayed version of the fantastic 'Let's Be Adult' by Ambitious Lovers, Arto Lindsay's skewed pop project with keyboardist Peter Scherer. Lindsay was also in no-wavers DNA, The Golden Palominos and John Zorn's Locus Solus ensemble.

But back to Mutya. A quick scan of Wikipedia reveals that she is now training to be a child psychologist and paid £5,000 for bum implants in 2009, a procedure I doubt Arto Lindsay has ever considered.

The much-venerated Pitchfork Media described 'Song 4 Mutya' as 'inspired' and 'glorious'.

Get Well Soon

Don't stop the dance, Fez. You big Tory bastard.

Madonna (by Sparks)

(Russell, as he may have looked when he caught Madonna's eye)

"I walked out on the street

While the big city lights

Tried to sell me on a way of life

I was already living..."

#2 in my featured 'talking' songs (also from 1988, coincidentally), 'Madonna' is the story of a one night stand that doesn't end well. It's far from being a classic Sparks record, and yet I've always found myself captivated by the idea of Ms. Ciccone slowing down in her "limousine longer than the Golden Gate Bridge" to pick up the narrow-hipped and handsomely maned Mr. Mael (Junior) off the streets of San Francisco.

This track was introduced to me by my friend David, a fellow Sparks fan, many moons ago. I had always avoided the 'Interior Design' album it comes from because of the woefully thin, tin-pot synth-pop production (the Mael brothers' first attempt to self-produce after working with a string of big names like Mack and Moroder), but I have since come to treasure 'Madonna' more as a series of images than anything else. ("She turned on a classical station, but the reception was poor".)

I've also long harboured a desire to cover the track, to recite the lyrics (which I know by heart) in a whacked-out, slutty drawl (à la Kim Gordon doing 'Tunic') over some fathoms-deep cosmic throb. But I don't suppose a Lancashire accent would really cut it...

Somewhere Down The Crazy River

"She said, you like it now

But you'll learn to love it later..."

A little while ago a pub conversation got me thinking about my favourite 'talking' records - tracks that feature a characterful, filmic narrative where a vocal melody would usually sit. I've compiled quite a list of them since and will be blogging on this theme when the fancy takes me.

First up is Robbie Robertson's 'Somewhere Down The Crazy River'. It came out in 1988 when I was ten - a year of total pop immersion for me. A time of obsessive chart taping, Casio keyboard programming and live 'broadcasting' direct to an endless supply of TDK C90s using my Dad's slimline AKAI pencil microphone.

I remember listening to Robbie's honeyed burr over and over again and feeling deeply absorbed by the mystery of it all. I didn't really know what he was on about, but I sensed the voodoo, the headiness, in my own way. Hilariously (looking back), I remember linking the track, mentally, to Um Bongo - of 'consumed in the Congo' fame. I felt certain that exotic liquid must spring from a similar kind of 'crazy river'.

These days, when I put my seven inch on, I am struck instantly by two things: the sheer atmosphere and potency of the lyric, and the stunning Manu Katché groove. I could disappear for days at a time down the cracks in that spacious groove. I've even managed to find some footage on YouTube of other drummers deconstructing it.

And last, but not least, of course, I must mention the great Daniel Lanois - I can almost smell Lanois all over this record...Eau De Lanois.

Gorgeous...

Just Be Good To Me

"I don't care about the other girls

Just be good to me..."

Such a heavy record.

The intro is so melancholy and grandiose I feel I have to get to my feet to listen to it like some knackered veteran hauling themselves up for The Star-Spangled Banner.

The lyric observes the time-honoured female-vocal tradition of 'shit on me, it's fine, just get on with it' best exemplified by 'Stand By Your Man', 'Don't Explain' (it's the Nina version for me) or Bobbie Gentry's 'I Wouldn't Be Surprised'.

A Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis production, it is perhaps second only to 'Sexual Healing', in the 'famous use of an 808' stakes.

Norman Cook's cover, 'Dub Be Good To Me', lent heavily on The Clash's 'Guns of Brixton' and sampled the harmonica from Morricone's 'Once Upon A Time in the West'. The opening and closing line, 'tank fly boss walk jam nitty gritty/you're listening to the boy from the big bad city, this is jam hot, this is jam hot', was from Johnny Dynell's 1983 hit 'Jam Hot', which was recently reswizzled by Tensnake.

Distressingly, 'Dub Be Good to Me' was covered in 2002 by Faithless and Dido for a Warchild charity album. Surely one of the most sinister pop collaborations of all time.

Just A Little

"And you're so innocent

Please don' take this wrong

'Cause it's a compliment..."

One of the songs I enjoyed hearing most at Pop 'Til You Drop on Saturday was Liberty X's 'Just A Little'. A mega-hit from 2002, it surprised many by proving that, occasionally, great records can emerge from the ashes of TV talent contests such as ITV's 'Popstars'. That series was, of course, won by those rampant disrespectors of the apostrophe, Hear'say - 'a veritable banquet of British pop talent', as Paul Adam, director of A&R at Polydor Records described them at the time.

'Just A little' - a number one - was followed cannily by a cover of Mantronix's 'Got To Have Your Love' (#2) and then Christmas single 'Holding On For You' (#5) . The latter, an arid, featureless ballad topped off with some very nasty drum programming, nevertheless burrowed its way into my affections that December. I love the harmonies, particularly evident at 2.51, and suspect that in the right producer's hands it could have been a gorgeous TLC-esque swoonathon.

Yeah?

Pop Til You Drop - Maiden Voyage!

Nasty Girl

"That's right, I can't control it

I need seven inches or more

Tonight, I can no longer hold it

Get it up, get it up, I can't wait anymore..."

'Nasty Girl' is a song written by Prince for his protégé girl group Vanity 6. Prince gave the songwriting credit to lead singer Vanity, although he was the writer and composer. It was the second single taken from their debut album 'Vanity 6' and was released in 1982.

Vanity is now a Christian preacher and has denounced 'Nasty Girl', telling members of her congregation who've listened to it to 'keep praying to the Holy Spirit'.

[Wikipedia]

Inaya Day had a hit with the track in 2004. Her version, which I used to love listening to in the car with an ex who always drove too fast, also tips a hefty wink to 'Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough', and was produced by the redoubtable Mr. Mousse T.

Orchestra Hit

(Waveform of an orchestra hit played on a Yamaha MU50 - XG mode)

An orchestra hit, also known as an orchestral hit, orchestra stab, or orchestral stab, is a sound created through the layering of the sounds of a number of different orchestral instruments playing a single staccato note or chord. The orchestra hit sound was propagated by the use of early samplers, particularly the Fairlight CMI where it was known as the ORCH5 sample. The sound is used in pop, hip hop and techno genres to accentuate passages of music.

[Wikipedia]

-

I've been playing with this all day:

http://free-loops.com/6976-orchestra-hit-4.html

This Is Pop?

"In a milk bar and feeling lost
Drinking sodas as cold as frost
Someone leans in my direction
Quizzing on my juke-box selection
What do you call that noise
That you put on?

This is pop
Yeah Yeah

This is!

On a walkway and moving fast
All I get is transistor blast
Someone leans in my direction
Quizzing on my station selection
What do you call that noise
That you put on?

This is pop
Yeah yeah

This is!

We come the wrong way
We come the long way
We play the songs much too loud

I consider this song to be a manifesto. The 1978 re-recording (starts 25 seconds in - TURN IT UP!) is superior to the original album version. I love the cheeky 'circus polka' keyboard solo at 1.18.

Before playing Girls Aloud to glaring indie boys in bars, I always give 'This Is Pop?' a spin. Like it or lump it, dickwads!

Isn't It Midnight

"Isn't it midnight

On the other side of the world?"

An overlooked Christine McVie song, 'Isn't It Midnight' was the vastly less successful follow-up to 'Everywhere' from 'Tango In The Night'. McVie wrote it with her then husband, the keyboard player Eddy Quintela, a non-member of Fleetwood Mac.

Having always had a soft spot for the track I snook it on at a friend's house a long time after midnight on Sunday morning just gone. Halfway through the guitar solo my friend delivered her verdict, head in hands:

'It's just so (long, drawn-out sigh of exasperation)....gash.'

This is an alternate mix taken from 'The Chain' box set - one of my favourite comps of all time.

I Do, I Do, I Do

"Love me or leave me

Make your choice, but believe me..."

Three years ago today the great Ola Brunkert, drummer for ABBA, died after an accidental fall at the age of 61. Brunkert hit his head against a glass door in his dining room in Mallorca, shattering the glass and cutting himself in the neck. He had managed to wrap a towel around his neck and leave the house to seek help, but collapsed in the garden.

Strangely enough, when I was in M&S today snatching a few stolen moments with Myra, my favourite mannequin, 'I Do, I Do, I Do' came on. Not one of Ola's grooviest moments, I'll concur, but nevertheless an ABBA song of which I am unwaveringly fond. Its torpid post-glam triplets, sleazy saxes and screamingly predictable key lift at the end all say 'IT'S CHRIIIIIIIIIISTMAS!' to me. Albeit Christmas on your own with a pale ale down the Emmanuel Street Labour Club in Plungington.

This ABBA performance is notable for those electric blue suits and the palpable tension between Agnetha and Frida, who loathed each other's guts at this point.

Play The Game

"When you're feeling down and your resistance is low

Light another cigarette and let yourself go..."

'Play the Game' is my favourite Queen song. It opens with a spacey rush of Oberheim OB-X synth and features one of Brian May's most rhapsodic solos. The exquisite Gershwin-esque vocal melody and 'fuck it!' lyrics are among Freddie's best. This is Queen at the peak of their powers: a four piece perfectly quartered.

Some years ago I saw a sketch on TV by (I think) Bill Bailey, which involved him dissecting the 'Play the Game' video. He pointed out that at exactly two minutes into the clip, John Deacon steadfastly refuses to play said game. A hilarious pop moment.

In an NME review of a Queen gig in the eighties, a journalist described John Deacon's bass-playing style as 'like a man trying to flick a wasp off his waist'.

Beggin'

"I need you to understand

That I tried so hard

To be your man..."

Timebox were a mod/psyche/pop band from Southport formed in 1965. They covered 'Beggin'' in '68 and their version is as passionate as the Frankie Valli original and also brilliantly orchestrated. I like to play this one out at the moment. The ladies love it!

Beggin'

"I'm fighting hard

To hold my own

No, I just cant make it

All alone..."

One of the best Radio 1 Live Lounge covers ever. I love the energy and the refusal to change the gender of the lyrics. Also a little nod to Monty Norman's Bond theme on guitar.

The Saturdays second single, 'Up' is another favourite of mine. I find the groove (reminiscent of MJ's 'The Way You Make Me Feel') impossible to resist. Watch the video here.

"This is the final call for all destinations,

This is were you're in or out!

No hesitation, this is not the time for doubt!"

The Right Stuff (Dub)

"She's mountain high, river deep

The right stuff..."

I always loved the dub of Bryan Ferry's 'The Right Stuff', a track co-written with Johnny Marr in 1987. 'The Right Stuff' started life as 'Money Changes Everything', a Smiths instrumental originally released as the B-side of 'Bigmouth Strikes Again'. Bryan and Johnny sexed-up the earlier track, adding lyrics, female BVs and a clubbier, extended dub produced by Patrick Leonard, who was behind lots of Madonna's hits, including 'Who's That Girl?' and 'Like A Prayer'. I doubt Morrissey was amused.

Who Gets Your Love?

"Who gets your love when I'm gone?

Will she kiss you with her eyes

Choose your ties, keep your pillow warm?"

An underrated slice of heartbreak pop balladry from Dusty's hard-to-find 1973 album 'Cameo'. Features the legendary Carol Kaye, one of the world's most prolific bass players - and a bird to boot! - whose sessions include Good Vibrations, Mission: Impossible, These Boots Are Made For Walking and Wichita Lineman.

'Who Gets Your Love?' was also recorded (equally soulfully) by reggae star Ken Boothe in 1978 with Sly and Robbie. I notice on this seven inch he has claimed the songwriting credit, which may not have pleased Dennis Lambert and Brian Potter, the original writer/producers. Ace, nevertheless.