Good morning! It's time for #DiscoverWeekly (h/t @Spotify ofc)
Track 1 is "Lazy Sunday", Small Faces. Impossible not to know for a Brit of a certain age but very listenable, and it's no surprise to find that Johnny Rotten cites the Faces as an influence on his vocal style.
Track 1 is "Lazy Sunday", Small Faces. Impossible not to know for a Brit of a certain age but very listenable, and it's no surprise to find that Johnny Rotten cites the Faces as an influence on his vocal style.
Track 2 is "The Plastic Age", The Buggles (1980). Never heard it, very good indeed. The vocals flip between sounding like Suggs and Jon Anderson, and the whole thing goes down very nicely.
Track 3, "A Girl Called Johnny", The Waterboys. Just a bit dull for my taste, although this might be a case of Seinfeld Is Unfunny; so influential that all the bands who copied them have soured me on the sound. Nothing terrible though.
Track 4, "Two Tribes", Frankie Goes To Hollywood (1984). Trevor Horn shows up again, absolute stone classic of my childhood. Someone of the calibre of David Guetta or Tiësto should release a version tomorrow, it would sell like hell.
Track 5 is "I Can't Live In A Living Room", Red Zebra (1980). A Belgian post-punk act, who sound like Tubeway Army would have if Gary Numan hadn't fallen over a synthesiser in 1978. Really good, full of dystopia. The mind inserts John Peel's voice after, introducing Napalm Death.
Track 6 is "Tusk", Fleetwood Mac (2015 RM 1979). Over-indulgent, meaningless, let's see how much money we can spaff on weird arrangements because it's better than sticking it up our noses. I love FM but this is terrible.
Track 7 is "Do The Bartman", The Simpsons (1990). Backing vocals by Michael Jackson. The only interesting or good thing about the song. The beginning of the Simpsons' marketing juggernaut. Skip.
Track 8, "My Sharona", The Knack (1979). Weird Al did it better. Skip.
Track 9, "Wonderwall", The Mike Flowers Pops (1996). Take your knowing irony and conscious kitsch and stick them up your arse. A lot of the 90s was awesome but this was the downside. Pause and skip.
Track 10, "Waving Flags", British Sea Power (2007). I'm a sucker for a BBC Radio 6 playlist track, me. Arguably the drums are a bit high in the mix, but this is very well done otherwise. Very accessible and firmly aimed at wisful Gen X types like me.
Track 11, "Driving Away From Home (Jim's Tune)", It's Immaterial (1986). Didn't know it until the hook kicked in. The rest of the song is dull. Sorry, skip.
Track 12, "Cool for Cats", Squeeze (1979). Squeeze are bloody brilliant, this was great then and still is. Difford and Tilbrook, the band's songwriters, didn't miss often and deserve a lot more respect.
Track 13, "Wilmot", The Sabres of Paradise (1994). From an album called "Haunted Dancehall", which sums it up nicely. Co-produced by Mr. Scruff. Not a lot there, I'm afraid. Skip, slightly regretfully.
Track 14, "Shake Your Head (Let's Go To Bed", Was Not Was (1983). Blech. Terrible, with Ozzy essentially rapping the lyrics. Left for dead by the 1992 version which had funk, Kim Basinger, and Ozzy actually singing. Hugely disappointing, WNW could be far better than this. Skip.
Track 15, "Somebody Is Watching Me", Rockwell (1984). A second appearance of Michael Jackson on backing, which explains the Thriller lyric steal. Far from bad, but if anyone else had recorded this Jacko would have summoned the lawyers ASAP. Great hook, though.
Track 16,"Have Love Will Travel", The Sonics (1965), also known as "that song off the LV= adverts". Perfectly inoffensive piece of early funk rock. Short and sweet.
Track 17, "Dry The Rain", The Beta Band (1997). Vaguely Beck-ish, but actually sound like a band. Slow build which ends up reminding me of "Loaded" by Primal Scream, no bad thing at all. I knew I liked the Betas but this makes me wish I'd got on board at the time.
Track 18, "Sex & Drugs & Rock'n'Roll", Ian Dury & The Blockheads (Live at Rockpoint 1979). Bloody marvellous. Another songwriter who rarely missed the mark. (His son Baxter's very good indeed, too.)
Track 19, "Truckers Delight", Flairs (2009). Ooo. A spot of hardbag, don't mind if I do. Pleasantly strange. Apparently the video was filthy and went viral. Not averse but not something I'd seek out.
Track 20, "Antibodies", Poni Hoax, (2008). French synth-rock, which started as Ian Curtis fronting Daft Punk but ended up reminding me of "War of the Worlds" by Jeff Wayne. It's exactly that epic sound they seem to be aiming for. Worth a second listen. Really, really peculiar.
Track 20, "Battle Without Honor Or Humanity", HOTEI (2004). You know this, it was in "Kill Bill" and loads of other things since. Alas, familiarity has bred contempt. Skip.
Track 21,"Surfin' Bird", The Trashmen (1963). Fuck you, Seth MacFarlane. I used to love this song. Skip.
Track 22, "Rattlesnakes", Lloyd Cole and the Commotions (1984) but this could come out amid today's glut of (admittedly competent) white male singer-songwriters and no-one would bat an eyelid. Sounds called it "uncontroversial" at the time; not too far off the mark.
Track 23, "Johnny Come Home", Fine Young Cannibals (1985). Tight, emotive, powerful with great vocals - Roland Gift is another British artist who doesn't get enough respect. More like this please.
Track 24, "The Man With The Red Face", Laurent Garnier (2005). More spooky techno. This gets an awful lot of respect in the genre. I'm not convinced. Not hard enough for me, I'm afraid. Probably would have loved it if I were a decade younger and I'd heard it while off my tits.
Track 25, "Mathar", Dave Pike Set (1969). And here's your serving of cultural appropriation for the day. I winced at the sitar opening (played by one Volker Kriegel, I shit you not). Blandest thing on the menu. Skip.
Track 26, "Sliced Tomatoes", Just Brothers (1972) but you probably know it as the core of "The Rockafeller Skank" by Fatboy Slim. Far from bad, but a little bit broken by association. Sorry, skip.
Track 27, "Oh My God", Kaiser Chiefs (2004). As a certain munchkin once noted, nothing that XTC wouldn't be doing (better!) but for Andy Partridge's horrific stage-fright, poor sod. Listen to the Mark Robson/Lily Allen version instead, much better. Pause and skip.
(oops) Track 29, "Killer", Seal (1990). Sorry, but I'm an 80s throwback, and the original by Adamski was far better. Skip.
Track 30, "Wannabe In L.A.", Eagles of Death Metal, (2008). Aimless and uninteresting. I don't know what QOTSA have that this band don't, but there's something missing here. Skip. Listen to their cover of "Save A Prayer For Me Now" instead; still empty but better.
And that's the end of #DiscoverWeekly for week 2 of November. Here's the link: open.spotify.com/user/spotify/p…
Peace, love and cupcakes to you all.
Peace, love and cupcakes to you all.
@threadreaderapp unroll please!
