Stronger

Wanted to write something about the 50 songs I chose in the previous blog post, just some observations on a song by song basis - won't do it for them all. Don't read on if you're dealing with some grief right now, as it's about loss and I hate to upset people.

STRONGER - Sugababes

(single, 2002, from album "Angels with Dirty Faces)

Oh fuck.

Pop music as emotional trigger.

Sugababes released a string of what the kids call absolute bangers at the start of the century, an all time John Cazale style run. If we do anything well in this country its pop music, and girl group pop music especially. And I could have picked “Freak Like Me”, “Round Round” (especially the Soulwax mix), "Overload" or even “Push the Button”.

But Stronger is the one for me, even if it does take me back some place I'd rather not go.

We had a kitten called Marvin. He came along with his sister Millie in the package labelled “New Girlfriend.” It was a good package, an instant family.

A few months later my stepdad died. 

A friend came to cat sit whilst we attended the funeral. Marvin, being a fucking lunatic, ran out of the door the moment the cat sitter arrived and got hit by a car. He survived but with a problem that wouldn’t get any better and we spent a fortune on vet’s bills before facing up to the vet's assertion we were just prolonging his agony. The day we took him on his final journey was grim, a fortnight before Christmas, the rain lashing down. And the vets is only round the corner so we walk and he’s meowing like mad, loudest he’s been in some time. And it’s not really my kitten, it’s my girlfriend’s, I tell myself, I'm going to be ok. I’m alright with this decision. It’s not fair to see him in so much pain. I’m going to be there for her, I’m carrying the cage because it’s heavy and it’s only a 5-minute walk but it takes forever and the vet sees us straight away.

Of course Marvin climbs out of the cage like he’s better, not fucked, not half crippled and yelping in pain continually. A ginger Lazarus. One last act of defiance. And I can feel myself going, the lip is wobbling, the eyes are misting up. The vet, she strokes him and then Marvin, the little prick, starts playing with a stethoscope round her neck like he’s back in good health, still got some play in him. And it’s that that fucking kills me. I can’t be there for this. I run out of the room, completely overcome, can’t be there and I’m properly uncontrollably and undignifiedly puke-crying in the street.

I want to get absolutely fucked on booze but I can’t and I don’t, I wait for my girlfriend and she comes out and I pull myself together and we walk home in the wet dark silence. Later that evening I’m making a cup of tea for us and the radio is on in the kitchen and Stronger comes on and it’s all too raw and literal and I’m shaking with grief and anger and it reminds me that I’m no good at this stuff. I can’t be strong around loss and pain. And this song becomes stuck in my head for the next few days. I buy the record, I play it repeatedly, it purges me of something but I feel guilty about the level of my anguish. I shouldn’t feel this much but I do.

Stronger is an anthem of defiance, a song that transports me instantly to those unbearable moments.  It's Unfinished Sympathy for the pop kids. And it’s Marvin’s song now. Even now, 21 years later, I’m back on that walk, the cage swinging in my left hand as he rocks it around, trying to make sense of his final minutes, the condemned man. And it’s a magnificent pop song that can do that thing where you say to yourself that you almost enjoy that misery, because it’s like another instrument playing at a frequency only you can hear. 

So probably shouldn't have had the song on this morning in the gym....

50 best singles of the 21st century

Inspired by, but feeling too late to join in with, the hashtag #FearofMu21C on Twitter - thought I'd have a crack at picking my own selection of the best 50 singles of the 21st century so far. Research led me to realise belatedly that songs I thought were singles actually weren't, a symptom of the streaming era I guess. Can't tell you the last single I bought, going back a while. I think it might be a split single between Marissa Nadler and Father JOhn Misty where they each covered one of the other's songs. Neither track made this list, though the Nadler one is pretty cool. Decided to not include remixes as that seems like another sort of playlist, also I would end up having about 8 Soulwax ones...

So, here we go, in reverse order....

50th place - Let's Make Love And Listen to Death From Above - CSS. 

49 - Proserpina - Martha Wainwright

48 - I Need Some Fine Wine and You Need To Be Nicer - Cardigans

47 - 1 Thing - Amerie

46 - Hurt - Johnny Cash

45 - Johnny Cash - Sons and Daughters

44 - Wild Young Hearts - Noisettes

43 - Midnight Sun - Nilufer Yanya

42 - More Than A Woman - Aaliyah

41 - The Suburbs - Arcade Fire

40 - 1980 - Estelle

39 - You Let My Tyres Down - Tropical Fuck Storm

38 - Digital Love - Daft Punk

37 - Mistaken For Strangers - National

36 - A Private Understanding - Protomartyr

35 - There, There - Radiohead

34 - Ibithaj - Rapsody

33 - Panique - Juniore

32 - Reagan - Killer Mike

31 - Seventeen - Ladytron

30 - Losing My Edge - LCD Soundsystem

29 - Show Me - Mint Royale

28 - Feel It Still - Portugal, The Man

27 - Remember Me - Sea Power

26 - Fascination - Alphabeat

25 - Sunglasses - Black Country, New Road

24 - The Isle of Arran - Lloyd Carner

23 - Get Yr Freak On - Missy Elliot

22 - Mirrors - Justin Timberlake

21 - She Wants to Move - N*E*R*D

20 - 212 - Azalea Banks

19 - Do You Realise? - Flaming Lips

18 - Danger! High Voltage - Electric Six

17 - Human - Molly Sarle

16 - Dedicated to My Ex - Lloyd

15 - Straight to the Morning - Hot Chip feat Jarvis Cocker

14 - Laura - Scissor Sisters

13 - Not - Big Thief

12 - The Spoils - Massive Attack

11 - Since I Left You - Avalanches

10 - The Rat - The Walkmen

9 - Toxic - Britney Spears

8 - Maps - Yeah Yeah Yeahs

7 - Stronger - Sugababes

6 - Something Kinda Oooh - Girls Aloud

5 - Crazy in Love pt 1 - Beyonce

4 - Video Games - Lana Del Rey

3 - With Every Heartbeat - Robyn

2 - Maneater - Nelly Furtado

1 - Hey Ya - Outkast

Playlist here - complaints to the usual address....

New short story - October

 

October

 

It was the last birthday card he ever bought for his wife.

He wasn’t to know it, wasn’t to know any of the things that could happen in the next twelve months. Who amongst us truly sees the future? The card had been selected against a number of criteria. Firstly, that it was not in any way sentimental. Secondly, that it did not feature the word “wife” in any way on the front of the card. Third, it did not feature teddy bears or kittens. Fourth, it looked like some actual decision had been made to choose this card and of course, finally, it had to come in at around the small amount of coins in his battered wallet.

There was a small amount of shame to be had in taking the plastic bag with the shop’s name to hold the card. But the card might get crumpled in the inside pocket of his jacket and those looked like rain clouds up ahead. The bag felt flimsy, cheap and reminded the man of his current economic status.

They had once been madly in love and got married without either of them really considering what it might take to shake the foundations of that madness. Within a year of the confetti each had cheated on the other without the other finding out. Things like that happen in life. A Christmas party, too much alcohol, a feeling of wanting to try something different, feeling dangerous. That was her story. His was another kind of boredom. An email from an ex. Then another. Then phone calls and lies. And a hotel room that he had let the ex pay for on her card, not his. There was no chivalry that day, how could there be. There was only a brief feeling of excitement, and no little shame after.

He was thinking of that afternoon now in the autumn wind. The bag in his hand blew weakly. The man imagined a scenario where he’d already written the birthday message and the words were being blown across the card, leaving streaks of biro and no words of congratulation or love in their inky wake.

I only met that man the one time. He was sat next to me on the red seat at the bus stop outside Boots. He didn’t share any of that stuff with me, I just made it all up for this story. He had only glanced at me for a second, nodded at the same thin bag in my hand from the same card shop as mine and smiled in a way that unsettled me. Not then, but much later.

Red Converse

Any amateur psychologist would trace the start of this collection to the death of your mother. Walking home from the funeral, you came across a real find. A giant Perspex letter H, fallen from the side of a closed down factory. They made plumbing supplies there. The H was Impact font. You dragged it down the alleyways, crossed into the lane that your house backed onto. It was an effort, heaving the little rugby posts through the back gate, but you still went back to see if other letters had jumped.

In the winter you trained yourself to see these things before others. Lone gloves, lost scarves, a bus pass, a Madness cassette. Nothing as large as that H, but everything just as precious.

Sometimes the finds felt wrong, but only for a second. An engagement ring in an open swimming pool locker, a walking stick against a graveyard gate. The shed became a museum. You bought a padlock with a fiver you saw fall from a paper boy’s pocket on Christmas Eve.

You hadn’t told anyone about your collection. It was sacred to you, a secret from the world. When the first item appeared outside your back gate that January morning, you thought it a coincidence. A bucket and spade, the castle turrets still flecked with old sand.

Soon, other items appeared – a skipping rope, a stuffed guinea pig, two bibles.

Then the knife.

Now you don’t want to go out. But the urge is so strong. What will be outside today?

You pull on your tattered red Converse, the hole in the right sole getting bigger. You pull at the gate and as you do so something tells you it is already too late.

To the tune of Cool for Cats

 (with all apologies to Difford and Tillbrook)

1.

The jingles and the mingles that were promised in the card

Will all go undetected by the boys from Scotland Yard

The wankers at the party, they might get an OBE

And nothing will be done about the fast track PPE

Boris laughed at all the nurses and he laughed at you and me

And we haven’t even started on the parties in his flat

And everybody knows it’s cos we’re run by Tory twats

It's Tory twats (Tory twats)

2.

Nadine is on the lagers 'cause she’s got the word to go

She’s been promised a sweet peerage by a fat Lothario

But Rishi’s put the kybosh on the changes to her name

And Boris shoved some new young blonde into the honours frame

It's funny how his missus always look the bleeding same

And meanwhile in the video there's a couple of likely lads

Who are breaking their own lockdown cos they’re evil Tory twats

They're Tory twats (Tory twats)

3.

To change the mood a little I've been going down the pub

Cos until the next election, I’ll be feeling in the dumps

I fancy clothes, I fancy heat, I can’t afford the gas

I get a little food in but I spend a load of cash

And all I feel is bitter and I end up on the lash

And by the time I'm sober I've forgotten why I’m sad

And then I turn the news on and I see the Tory twats

The tory twats (Tory twats)

4. 

Shape up at the foodbank and there’s nurses in the queue

The morgues are full of corpses and the river’s full of poo

Rishi’s in his chopper cos he wants to miss a vote

Suella’s on the telly and she’s yelling stop the boats

I go to scream myself but it just sticks inside my throat

The media lead the way in distorting all the facts

Cos All you see on telly is a bunch of Tory twats

The tory twats.....

50 Years of Dark Side of the Moon

Danny Baker likes this album. Jeremy Clarkson does too. And that should be enough to dismiss it as utter toss shouldn't it? That two of the biggest egotistical buffoons on British television should share a common appreciation of this megalith of progressive rock. Circumstantial evidence sure but damning, nonetheless.

Here's some more.

A few years back, two public school boys found themselves in hot water when they decided to help themselves to some gratis souvenirs from Auschwitz. Maybe there isn't a gift shop there. Maybe it's one of the few places on earth except from the sound of ringing tills ( more of those later ) and wanton commercial last because this was a factory of human destruction, perhaps even the worst place that has ever been on earth. And these lads thought, well we'll just have to take a memento then. These two boys went to the same school as Pink Floyd.

So, this is it then. The album that finally links Clarkson with the Holocaust. It sold 8 billion copies. It's not about the moon. It's got a cover by a man called Storm. It's still absolute fucking rubbish.

It starts, as any fule kno, with the sound of a beating heart. Instantly, the discerning ear should have their bullshit detector at full blast. Eventually, after what feels like an eternity, some singing occurs. This song is called “Breathe” - Prodigy covered it later and had the idea of removing all the 6th form lyrics and adding on much needed attitude, drugs and a tune. Then Pink Floyd decide to invent electronica and somehow it's boring. A song about mental illness called “On The Run” by a band who kicked a founding member out because of their mental illness and it's still dull.

Because that's what Dark Side of the Moon is, an album so geared to capturing the futility of reconciling our humanity with the psychological demands of modern life, that it actually feels like going to work.

Then a song called “Time”. Time starts with the sound of clocks. All that expensive education and the world's most state-of-the-art recording equipment at your disposal and you write a song called Time and stick the sounds of clocks on it. No doubt if they turned out the Britney Spears classic “Baby hit me one more time” it would have started with the sound of someone being slapped and whimpering “Again”.

Dark Side of the Moon doesn't have anything as thrilling or vital as those three piano notes at the start at Britney’s classic. It's just hour upon hour of competently played tedium with lyrics that even Pete Doherty would blanch at. Continuing their use of subtle sound effects, Money has the sound of tills on it. Sadly, “Brain Damage” proves not to be as tasteless as well might have hoped.

If you play this album at the same time as watching the Wizard of Oz, apparently what happens is you get old and get a golf dinner celebrating your 20 years in charge of business loans at the Chingford branch of The Bank of Suddenly Reactionary Middle-Aged Bastards. This is an album awash with such mythology, a legendary status which it simply doesn't deserve. People tell me that it's an album you need to wash over you, presumably with some suitably bohemian soft furnishings and a “doobie”.

Such is the enduring nature of that particular lie that Pink Floyd, not content with selling 45,000 trillion copies of this record, re-released it as in immersion edition. The Venn diagram of people who bought the immersion edition of dark side of the moon and idiots has no overlap it is just a fucking plain white circle, a dull and empty moon.