Category Archives: Lists

Good Lyrics Of The 1980s

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Joni_Mitchell_2004It has to be said, it was a bit easier coming up with good ’80s lyrics than it was to come up with crap ones.

I could probably have chosen three or four crackers from many of the artists featured below, but space permits only one. Maybe it’s not surprising that it was a great decade for lyricists when it was surely one of the most ‘literary’ musical decades to date – it would have to be with people like Bob Dylan, Morrissey, Paddy McAloon, Andy Partridge, Green Gartside, Tracey Thorn, Lloyd Cole, Joni Mitchell, Peter Gabriel and Springsteen around.

So here’s just a sprinkling of my favourites from the ’80s. Let me know yours.

‘I love you/You pay my rent‘

PET SHOP BOYS: ‘Rent’

 

Brother in the codpiece/I’ve seen him on the TV/I think he likes his ladies all sweet and sugary/I’m partial to a pudding/But that’s for second course/The main meal and the hors d’oeuvres must be smothered in hot sauce’

THOMAS DOLBY: ‘Hot Sauce’ (lyrics by George Clinton)

 

‘I believe in love/I’ll believe in anything/That’s gonna get me what I want/And get me off my knees’

LLOYD COLE AND THE COMMOTIONS: ‘Forest Fire’

 

‘I want you/It’s the stupid details that my heart is breaking for/It’s the way your shoulders shake and what they’re shaking for’

ELVIS COSTELLO: ‘I Want You’

 

‘Hey Mikey/Whatever happened to the f***in’ “Duke Of Earl”?’

RANDY NEWMAN: ‘Mikey’s’

 

‘If you had that house, car, bottle, jar/Your lovers would look like movie stars’

JONI MITCHELL: ‘The Reoccurring Dream’

 

‘Lost my shape/Trying to act casual/Can’t stop/I might end up in the hospital’

TALKING HEADS: ‘Crosseyed And Painless’

 

‘Once there was an angel/An angel and some friends/Who flew around from song to song/Making up the ends’

DANNY WILSON: ‘Never Gonna Be The Same’

 

‘Burn down the disco/Hang the blessed DJ’

THE SMITHS: ‘Panic’

 

‘Now the moon’s gone to hell/And the sun’s riding high/I must bid you farewell/Every man has to die/But it’s written in the starlight/And every line in your palm/We are fools to make war/On our brothers in arms’

DIRE STRAITS: ‘Brothers In Arms’

 

‘Out on the road today/I saw a Deadhead sticker on a Cadillac/A little voice inside my head said/Don’t look back, you can never look back…’

DON HENLEY: ‘Boys Of Summer’

 

‘Hello Johnson/Your mother once gave me a lift back from school/There’s no reason to get so excited/
I’d been playing football with the youngsters/Johnson says don’t dramatise/And you can’t even spell salacious’

PREFAB SPROUT: ‘Horsechimes’

 

‘I repeat myself when under stress/I repeat myself when under stress/I repeat…’

KING CRIMSON: ‘Indiscipline’

 

‘Come back Mum and Dad/You’re growing apart/You know that I’m growing up sad/I need some attention/I shoot into the light’

PETER GABRIEL: ‘Family Snapshot’

 

‘People say that I’m no good/Painting pictures and carving wood/Be a rich man if I could/But the only job I do well is here on the farm/And it’s breaking my back’

XTC: ‘Love On A Farmboy’s Wages’

 

‘So long, child/It’s awful dark’

DAVID BOWIE: ‘When The Wind Blows’

 

‘I could have been someone/Well so could anyone’

THE POGUES/KIRSTY MACCOLL: ‘Fairytale Of New York’

 

‘It’s an 18 carat love affair/I don’t know which side I’m on/But my best friend John said not to care’

ASSOCIATES: ’18 CARAT LOVE AFFAIR’

Crap Lyrics Of The 1980s (Part One)

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dynasty_wallpaper_by_mabmeddowsmercuryDuring a 1981 interview, Peter Gabriel said: ‘Many great songs have really appalling lyrics, but no great songs have had appalling music. If you’re going to write lyrics, you might as well make them try and communicate something.’

Sadly, it was a maxim ignored by many of his contemporaries in the ’80s pop pantheon… But these sad wretches have our sympathies; anyone who’s ever tried to pen a song knows the potential pitfalls.

Got a good melody? Great, but you’ve got to sustain the lyrical narrative across the whole song in a cogent way (got that, Coldplay and Keane?). Got some words? Handy, but it can be very tricky to fit a melody to ‘poetic’ ramblings. Basically, for every ‘Talking Scarlet‘, there’s a ‘With Or Without You’.

So join us as we take a trip through a collection of the sometimes inane, occasionally coarse, often totally meaningless ramblings of the 1980s. And don’t forget – sometimes these lexical disaster-areas didn’t detract from the quality of the song at all. But sometimes they did…

‘Sittin’ on a mountain, looking at the sun/Plastic fantastic lobster telephone’.
THE CULT: ‘Electric’

‘Heart of mine, sewing frenzies of steel to the sky/By night, a child in a harvest of virginal mines’.
IT BITES: ‘Midnight’

‘This morning there was joy in my heart cos I know that I loved you so/Scrambled eggs are so boring, for you’re all, all that I want to know’.
PRINCE: ‘Life Can Be So Nice’

‘She’s got eyes like saucers, oh you think she’s a dish/She is the blue chip that belongs to the big fish’.
ELVIS COSTELLO: ‘Big Sister’s Clothes’

‘I know that I must do what’s right/As sure as Kilimanjaro rises like Olympus above the Serengeti’.
TOTO: ‘Africa’

‘Only time will tell if we can stand the test of time’.
VAN HALEN: ‘Why Can’t This Be Love’

‘I’m so bad I can suck my own d*ck’.
LL COOL J: ‘Clap Your Hands’

‘Late spring and you’re drifting off to sleep/With your teeth in your mouth’.
REM: ‘You Are The Everything’

‘Let’s go crazy, let’s get nuts/Look for the purple banana til they put us in the truck’.
PRINCE: ‘Let’s Go Crazy’

‘You set my teeth on edge/You think you’re a vegetable, never come out of the fridge/C-c-c-cucumber/ C-c-c-cabbage/C-c-c-cauliflower!’
ECHO & THE BUNNYMEN: ‘Thorn Of Crowns’

‘Where does it go from here/Is it down to the lake I fear/Ay-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya/Ah-ya/Ah-ya-ya-ya-ya-ya’
HAIRCUT ONE HUNDRED: ‘Love Plus One’

‘Oh babe/I wanna put my log in your fireplace’.
KISS: ‘Burn Bitch Burn’

‘A stripping puppet on a liquid stick gets into it pretty thick/A butterfly drinks a turtle’s tears/But how do you know he really needs it?’
ELVIS COSTELLO: ‘Deep Dark Truthful Mirror’

‘Every second counts when I am with you/I think you are a pig, you should be in a zoo’.
NEW ORDER: ‘Every Second Counts’

Bigmouth Strikes Again: The 36 Greatest Music Quotes Of The 1980s

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chrissie hyndeMusicians gave good quote in the ’80s.

There were various factors at play: an eclectic, popular, influential music press, a phalanx of opinionated, ambitious journos, the rise of tabloid ‘diaries’ and of course a surfeit of great interviewees.

The decade’s cultural mix of politics, drugs, sex, music and fashion also made for a rich brew of conversation topics.

Young, gobby and fearless artists wanted to make a significant first impression, knowing that good quotes made great publicity, while the big names of the ’70s were still hellbent on coming across as relevant or at least engaged.

So here’s a parade of sometimes preposterous, sometimes profound, sometimes downright weird and sometimes even intelligent quotes, archived from interviews, anthologies and mags of the time, all unapologetically taken completely out of context:

36. ‘If you want to make a lot of money out of pop, be number 3 a lot. Like New Order did or The Cure. Because when you’re number one, you’re everybody’s – nobody really cares about you any more.’

Phil Oakey of Human League

 

35. ‘To be a producer in the ’80s required a mixture of being an electronics engineer, a computer whiz, a synthesist, a musician, a sound engineer, a diplomat, a psychologist. And to be able to do it for 18 hours a day every day.’

Martin Rushent (Stranglers/Altered Images/Human League producer)

 

34. ‘A lot of songs that have been called sexist are about my daughter. I did a song called Girl which went: “You treat me like a dog and I shake my tail for you”, because she’s the only girl who’s ever had me on all fours doing impressions of horses.’

David Coverdale of Whitesnake (1984)

 

33. ‘Women rule the world and no man has ever done anything that a woman either hasn’t allowed him to do or encouraged him to do.’

Bob Dylan (1984)

 

32. ‘Sex? I’d rather have a nice cup of tea.’

Boy George (1983)

 

31. ‘You do an interview and they ask you if your guitar is a phallic symbol. F**k off. I don’t hold it because it’s shaped like a cock, I hold it because it’s a guitar.’

Lita Ford (1989)

 

30. ‘A lot of people I know are dead because of him.’

Chrissie Hynde on Keith Richards (1986)

 

29. ‘I’ve smoked so much pot I’m surprised I haven’t turned into a bush.’

Joe Strummer (1984)

 

28. ‘I’m self-made. I always wanted to make myself a better person because I was not educated. But that was my dream – to have class.’

Tina Turner (1986)

 

27. ‘People only get one chance to meet you, and if you’re not an arsehole, why give them the opportunity of thinking you are?’

Phil Collins (1989)

 

26. ‘I don’t like to relax. Show me a motherf****r that’s relaxed and I’ll show you a motherf****r that’s scared of success.’

Miles Davis (1983)

 

25. ‘I think I’m fairly consistent with people. But at the end of the day, I don’t give a bollocks.’

Bob Geldof (1989)

 

24. ‘When you look like a cartoon, you act like a cartoon.’

Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top (1989)

 

23. ‘Fancy being a bee, leading an incredible existence, all those flowers, designed just for you, incredible colours, some trip.’

Kate Bush (1989)

 

22. ‘A lot of people think I’m clinically mad.’

Morrissey (1989)

 

21. ‘I’m as good as anyone. Even Prince.’

Kevin Rowland (1988)

 

20. ‘I don’t mean to sound big-headed but I honestly don’t think we’ve put a foot wrong in 20 years.’

Mike Rutherford of Genesis (1989)

 

19. ‘Don’t forget Spandau did “To Cut A Long Story Short”, “Chant No. 1” and “True” – three big changes in music.’

Gary Kemp (1984)

 

18. ‘One more hit and we’re the most successful girl group of all time. We’ll pass The Supremes. Sad, isn’t it?’

Sarah Dallin of Bananarama (1988)

 

17. ‘I was walking down the street the other day and I heard this sound. I thought it was a great new band playing something intriguing. It turned out to be an air conditioner unit in an elevator.’

Reeves Gabrels of Tin Machine (1989)

 

16. ‘Don’t buy one of those pointy guitars, kids. They’ll give ya VD.’

Paul Westerberg of The Replacements (1987)

 

15. ‘Unlike other guitarists, I don’t play things that are rubbish.’

Yngwie Malmsteen (1984)

 

14. ‘Some of our best songs were written on one string.’

The Edge of U2 (1987)

 

13. ‘I’ve just always been like this slowhand…like the arthritic guitar method.’

George Harrison (1988)

 

12. ‘I will say one thing – I invented the electric bass and everybody knows it.’

Jaco Pastorius (1983)

 

11. ‘Lots of people think songs without singing is not a song. Tell Beethoven that and he’ll kick your ass!’

Eddie Van Halen (1985)

 

10. ‘After the first album, Meat just lost it completely. “GRUNT! GRUNT! GRUNT! GRUNT!” I had to listen to that for nine months. That pig can’t sing a f***ing note.’

Meat Loaf producer Jim Steinman (1989)

 

9. ‘Protect my voice? From what? Vandals?’

Tom Waits (1983)

 

8. ‘I’m listening to my album now and wishing that I had kept my yap shut. I hate my voice. It just makes me sick.’

Chrissie Hynde (1989)

 

7. ‘Bob is Bob and he always will be. And that’s why he’s Bob.’

Jeff Lynne on Bob Dylan (1989)

 

6. ‘I hate it. It’s the worst. A pile of shit. There is not one good thing I can find to say about it.’

Lee Mavers of The La’s on their debut album (1989)

 

5. ‘I’m not putting Elvis down but he was a shit-ass, a yellow belly and I hated the f***er.’

Jerry Lee Lewis (1989)

 

4. ‘Once upon a time it was enough to know that U2 are crap, but not anymore. Now you’ve got to know why they’re crap.’

Julian Cope (1983)

 

3. ‘My son likes Madness. I though he was going to start liking A Flock Of Seagulls, which worried me a lot…’

David Bowie (1983)

 

2. ‘I get a strange swell of pride when I hear of our football hooligans causing trouble abroad.’

Joe Strummer (1989)

 

1. ‘If you’re unemployed in New York, you’re an artist. If you’re unemployed in LA, you’re an actor. In London, everyone’s unemployed so it doesn’t matter.’

Lydia Lunch (1983)

The 5 Creepiest Music Videos Of The 1980s

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Peter_gabriel_31081978_02_400In the 1980s, big-name directors generally had no qualms about helming pop videos: Landis, Scorsese, De Palma, Fincher, Peckinpah, Demme, Friedkin and Sayles all brought their visual sense to bear on the medium.

But if you weren’t tying the song in with a movie, you had to interpret the sometimes fairly nonsensical lyrics somehow (begging the question: were ’80s lyricists ever inspired by how their words would be interpreted in a song’s video?).

Given an almost blank slate, it’s fair to say that some directors’ imaginations ran riot; sometimes the storyboards got – how shall we put it kindly – a bit out of hand, riddled with disturbing symbols, disconcerting imagery and creepy concepts.

Here are five of the strangest clips of the decade:

5. David Bowie: ‘Underground’ (1986)
Legendary director Steve Barron (‘Beat It’, ‘Take On Me’) helmed this curio which accompanied David’s appearance in the movie ‘Labyrinth’. The song (which clearly influenced Madonna’s ‘Like A Prayer’ a few years later) seems to be about a young girl’s alienation and initiation into the adult world (‘No one can blame you for walking away… Daddy, daddy, get me out of here!’), echoing the movie’s plot. But the video goes off into very odd tangents: David dissolves into the floor, has a flashback to all his previous personas and then moves into a murky underworld where he becomes an animated character. The disembodied ‘helping hands’ from the movie mime to the gospel backing vocals and David dances with muppets before he rips off his ‘real’ face and becomes a cartoon character forever. Albert Collins’ earthy, raunchy blues licks seem a bit out of place alongside this surreal stew…

4. Laura Branigan: ‘Self Control’ (1984)
‘Exorcist’ director William Friedkin was in charge of this expensive curio. Words are hard to come by. This excellent analysis says it all really. Was the video an influence on Kubrick’s ‘Eyes Wide Shut’?

3. Bonnie Tyler: ‘Total Eclipse Of The Heart’ (1983)
Directed by another future Hollywood helmer Russell Mulcahy, this expensive weirdorama was filmed at the Holloway Sanatorium, a large, unused Victorian mental hospital in Surrey. It was a very apt choice of location: virginal boarding-school teacher Bonnie seems to be either dreaming or fantasizing about her students participating in various activities including swimming, karate, gymnastics, football, fencing, singing and dancing. As you do. Apparently there’s an urban legend that the boy who shakes Bonnie’s hand at the end is Italian footballer Gianfranco Zola. Let’s hope it’s true.

2. Peter Gabriel: ‘I Don’t Remember’ (1983)
This forbidding track, remixed from Peter Gabriel Plays Live, was never going to get a happy-clappy ‘Sound Of Music’-style vid, but it’s still pretty out-there. There are echoes of Bowie’s ‘Blackstar’ in its conflation of poverty, physical threat, trance-like states and religious reverence. ‘I Don’t Remember’ is certainly one of the most distinctive vids of the mid-’80s but seems way too menacing for wide appeal.

1. The Jacksons: ‘Torture’ (1984)
The track seems to be about the ‘torture’ of relationship breakdown but director Jeff Stein and designer Bryce Walmsley (hi, Bryce!) over-egg the concept something rotten here. It pretty much comes on like a manual for trauma-based mind control. Both Michael and Jermaine refused to appear in the video, which ran over time and over budget, driving its production company into bankruptcy. Almost unbelievably, a wax dummy of Jacko was rented from a Madame Tussaud’s in Nashville and appears in three sequences including the tragic and really quite sad final salute. Stein recalls the shoot as ‘an experience that lived up to the song title’ and says it was so stressful that one of his crew members lost control of her bodily functions. Vigilant Citizen has put together an excellent analysis of the video.

Any more for any more? Let me know below.

9 Embarrassing (But Great) Moments From ’80s Music TV

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grace There’s no escape these days.

Maybe your band were given a rollocking live on children’s TV or you turned up for a late-night interview slightly the worse for wear and made a bit of an arse of yourself thinking no one would be watching anyway.

Alas. It’s all retained for posterity on YouTube, and some smart aleck was poised with his finger on the VCR record button, primed for just such an indiscretion.

Some of these clips (parental discretion advised) I remember watching live, others have shown up occasionally on ‘TV Hell’-type compilation shows over the years, but they all make for great – if sometimes uncomfortable – viewing.

9. Five Star on ‘Going Live’, 1989
No, the Essex Jacksons were never the critics’ favourites, but this rhetorical question from a young caller may well have had more of a detrimental effect on their career than any NME scribe ever could.

8. Jools Holland interviews Andy Summers, 1981
Jools turned up in Monserrat while The Police were recording the Ghost In The Machine album, and he managed to ridicule their erstwhile guitarist’s demonstration of funk guitar (at 5:30). You must admit, Julian had a point…

7. Matt Bianco on ‘Saturday Superstore’, 1984
Yep, another nightmare phone-in situation, a subgenre full of guilty pleasures (from 1:00 below).

6. All About Eve on ‘Top Of The Pops’, 1988
The infamous appearance during which singer Julianne Regan and guitarist Tim Bricheno were blissfully unaware of the song’s playback in the studio. Cue lots of schoolyard sniggering, but the Eve had the last laugh – their single rose UP the charts the following week.

5. BA Robertson interviews Annabella Lwin, 1982
The singer/presenter comes seriously unstuck when broaching the gender issue with Bow Wow Wow’s superbly-spikey frontwoman (I say ‘woman’ – she was only 16 at the time…).

4. Grace Jones attacks Russell Harty, 1980
An intractable Grace is seriously miffed by Russell’s back-turning.

3. Shakin’ Stevens attacks Richard Madeley, 1980
Humour is clearly the animus here, but the sight of a lagered-up Shakey throttling the grannies’ favourite is still quite something.

2. Dexys Midnight Runners on ‘Top Of The Pops’, 1982
Did someone at the BBC really think the song was an ode to Scottish darts player John ‘Jocky’ Wilson rather than soul legend Jackie? Or was it a pisstake? (It was a pisstake and apparently Kevin Rowland’s idea… Ed.) I love the juxtaposition of Kevin’s intensity and Jocky’s grinning mush.

1. Wayne Hussey on ‘The James Whale Show’, March 1990
Just into the 1990s, but what the hell. The Mission mainman seems to have wandered into the studio after a long night on the razzle, but he met his match with the confrontational Mr Whale.

Six 1980s Christmas Songs Not Just For Christmas

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3175516482_2745396c60_bCrimbo, eh, readers?

The ’80s certainly has its fair share of duff Christmas tracks, maybe more than most decades, but at least there was a lot of variety.

The Christmas number one suddenly had prestige. Consequently a huge variety of artists tried their luck from Sting, The Eurythmics and U2 to Siouxsie And The Banshees, Jethro Tull and Depeche Mode.

Here are six Christmas singles from the 1980s that I could just about tolerate hearing any time of the year.

6. The Waitresses: Christmas Wrapping (1981)
The New York new-wavers’ charmingly-ramshackle little number has only grown in stature as a seasonal favourite despite not even making the UK top 100 on its December 1981 release.

5. The Three Wise Men: Thanks For Christmas (1983)
XTC in disguise. Andy Partridge came up with this very pleasant but almost totally ignored singalong, unfortunately released smack-bang in the middle of a period when the Swindon three-piece couldn’t get arrested. But what’s really cool about ‘Thanks For Christmas’ is THAT chord change…

4. David Bowie/Bing Crosby: Peace On Earth/Little Drummer Boy (1982)
Just two days on from taping a superb performance of ‘Heroes’ and a duet with Marc Bolan on the ‘Marc’ TV show, Bowie was invited onto Bing’s ‘Merrie Olde Christmas’ to film this great and genuinely surreal clip on 11th September 1977. Apparently the ‘Peace On Earth’ segment of the song was composed on the day of filming (by the show’s music consultants Ian Fraser and Larry Grossman) and rehearsed for only an hour before the cameras rolled – pretty impressive. When finally released as a single in 1982, ‘Peace On Earth/Little Drummer Boy’ peaked at number three in the chart. Was it a subconscious influence on the wistful ‘Fantastic Voyage’ released just over a year later?

3. Jona Lewie: Stop The Cavalry (1980)
Nothing says 1980 to me like this strange little Christmas song (though, according to Lewie, it wasn’t intended as such) which peaked at UK number three, only kept off the top spot by two posthumous John Lennon singles.

2. Band Aid: Do They Know It’s Christmas (1984)
Yes, it’s as over-familiar as an uncle’s Boxing Day bear hug, but it retains some power due to its musical-chairs approach, great Boy George vocals and the lack of a proper chorus. I think it was the first 7” single I actually went out and bought.

1. The Pogues Featuring Kirsty MacColl: Fairytale Of New York (1987)
Only the hardest heart could deny the poignancy of this all-time classic. Written, arranged, played and sung with consummate care, this tale of doomed love in the Big Apple reached number two in December 1987.

Happy Christmas to one and all.

From Diva To De Palma: Seven Soundtrack Moments

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withnail

Ralph Brown as Danny in ‘Withnail & I’

When it comes to the marriage of sound and vision, there’s a particular kind of ’80s cliché probably originating from the work of directors like Ridley/Tony Scott, Adrian Lyne, Hugh Hudson and Alan Parker (interestingly, all Brits who ended up in Hollywood).

It’s basically a slick, beautifully-shot montage of images usually accompanied by vaguely ‘New Age’ kind of music which probably features some Satie-esque piano, possibly some strings (synthesized or real) and/or a bit of acoustic guitar or sax.

Well, I’m here to tell you that this combo is pure comfort food for me in these troubled times. It must be another of those ‘blokes of a certain age’ things. And it turns out that some of those directors also produced some of my favourite movie soundtrack moments of the ’80s:

7. Diva (1981)
Composer Vladimir Cosma channels Erik Satie, Peter Gabriel and Tangerine Dream to create a beguiling mix of solo piano, bleak new-wave rock and classic minimalism. I don’t ‘do’ opera but the two versions of Catalani’s ‘La Wally’ which bookend this superb album get me every time.

6. Angel Heart (1987)
A bleak synth swells in the distance, De Niro (?) whispers ‘Johnny… Johnny…’ and we’re off. Courtney Pine blows impressively over Trevor Jones’ ambient backing and the rest of the album features some excellent crooner tunes and R’n’B too.

5. Blow Out (1981)
Melody-maestro Pino Donaggio pulls out all the stops for this rather beautiful theme which accompanies director Brian De Palma’s most ’emotional’ movie slaying…

4. Betty Blue (1986)
Gabriel Yared’s haunting soundtrack for this famously-overrated art-house melodrama gives me an instant nostalgia rush. Very influential too, particularly on the next choice.

3. Withnail & I (1987)
David Dundas and Rick Wentworth’s music perfectly evokes some of the film’s themes darker themes, though the blues guitar licks were perhaps best left out of the final mix.

2. 9 1/2 Weeks (1986)
The bizarre, chameleon-like career of pianist/composer Jack Nitzsche is one for another time, but his ‘love theme’ from Adrian Lyne’s guilty pleasure is sentimental, hokey and clichéd, and gets me every time. There are other crackers by Jean-Michel Jarre, Brian Eno and The Eurythmics on the quite-hard-to-find soundtrack album.

1. Mrs Soffel (1984)
A confession – I’ve never seen this movie. And I’m really not sure I ever will. But Mark Isham’s majestic theme never fails to beguile, originally heard on a mid-’80s Windham Hill Records taster cassette.

Six Dodgy Vocal Performances Of The 1980s

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Vocal-BoothIt’s fair to say that the 1980s spawned more than a few overproduced records.

Certainly in the second half of the decade, itchy-fingered knob-twiddlers were very quick to swamp a track with all the latest technical gizmos.

But it’s also a producer’s job to get the best out of the musicians and singers he/she is working with, and to that extent the 1980s produced a surprising amount of suspect vocal performances.

Of course, there’s such a thing as good out-of-tune (Dylan, Chrissie Hynde, Neil Young, Randy Newman, Lou Reed, Boy George, Wayne Coyne) but there’s also just…out-of-tune.

Producers often claim that a ‘pitchy’ vocal is acceptable if the emotional force is there, but sometimes you just have to say: ‘Let’s try that one again’ (apparently rarely a problem for one-take masters David Bowie, Aretha Franklin and Billy Mackenzie, though the latter would insist on endless retakes, driving many collaborators to distraction). And there was a lot of money floating about in the ’80s so we can’t really blame time or budget pressures.

Here are seven takes that were probably best left on the cutting room floor. More suggestions please.

6. Yazz: The Only Way Is Up
Maybe it’s the timbre, maybe it’s the pitching, but there’s just something so wrong about the vocals on this huge hit that drove many to distraction in 1988.

5. Wah!: Story Of The Blues
Where to begin? The whole song sounds pretty out-of-tune to me…

4. The Eurythmics: There Must Be An Angel (Playing With My Heart)
This is a weird one. Of course Annie is a fantastic singer, but virtually the whole middle eight sounds just ‘out’ to my ears. The fact that her voice is so high in the mix doesn’t help.

3. The Smiths: Shakespeare’s Sister
Morrissey was always on the verge of a bum note, often in a good way, but this pushes it way too far.

2. Bette Midler: Wind Beneath My Wings
A toe-curling vocal, particularly the ‘ad-libs’ towards the end.

1. The Communards: Don’t Leave Me This Way
Jimmy Somerville’s inimitable soprano is usually pretty damn foolproof but something goes seriously awry in the intro to this kitsch uber-hit. I blame guest singer Sarah Jane Morris.

My 15 Favourite Albums (Today)

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vinyl-goldLike a lot of music fans, I can’t resist a list, so here are my top 15 albums as of today.

I set myself a few guidelines: only one artist per slot, no dud tracks, no compilations, and some kind of stylistic variety on offer across the selection; in other words, I thought of the 15 albums as a kind of extended desert-island playlist.

In no particular order…

Lewis Taylor: Lewis Taylor (1996)

taylor-lewis-lewis-taylor

The Beatles: Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967)

original_460

Roxy Music: Avalon (1982)

roxy

Steely Dan: Gaucho (1980)

steely

Peter Gabriel: III (1980)

peter gabriel

Weather Report: Mr Gone (1978)

weather report

XTC: Skylarking (1985)

xtc

Cocteau Twins: Heaven Or Las Vegas (1990)

cocteau_twins-heaven_or_las_vegas

David Sylvian: Gone To Earth (1986)

David sylvian

Sly And The Family Stone: There’s A Riot Goin’ On (1971)

sly

Tribal Tech: Illicit (1992)

Tribal_Tech_Illicit_album_cover

Stanley Clarke: Stanley Clarke (1974)

Stanley_Clarke_-_Stanley_Clarke

Herbie Hancock/Freddie Hubbard/Wayne Shorter/Ron Carter/Tony Williams: VSOP The Quintet (1979)

vsop

John Martyn: Glorious Fool (1981)

john-martyn-glorious-fool

Scritti Politti: Cupid And Psyche ’85 (1985)

scritti

Just missed the cut:

Grace Jones: Nightclubbing (1981)

Prince: Around The World In A Day (1985)

Mr Bungle: California (1999)

It Bites: Once Around The World (1988)

Mark Isham: Vapour Drawings (1983)

Prefab Sprout: Jordan The Comeback (1990)

Michael Jackson: Thriller (1982)

Level 42: World Machine (1985)

Television (1992)

Thomas Dolby: The Flat Earth (1984)

John McLaughlin/One Truth Band: Electric Dreams (1979)

Miles Davis: Nefertiti (1967)

Love And Money: Strange Kind Of Love (1988)

David Bowie: Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps) (1980)

Thelonious Monk: Genius Of Modern Music Vol. 2 (1951)

Aztec Camera: Four Golden Greats

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Aztec-camera-roddy-frameIt all came back to me recently when I heard some church bells in Totnes ringing out the opening bass melody from ‘We Could Send Letters’.

Although always one of my AC favourites, I hadn’t heard the song in years. Cue a period of rediscovery and a realisation that Roddy Frame penned four or five stand-out songs of the ’80s.

The guy had it all – intelligent lyrics, guitar chops, classic songcraft, good looks. Arguably the only thing missing was the classic album that his talent warranted.

But no matter: there were plenty of treats anyway. Here are a few:

4. We Could Send Letters (1983)
The low-key beginning builds into an epic, love-lorn pop gem, oddly never released as a single. Though dated by its Syndrum fills and airy production, the song however is water-tight with that lovely hike up into the chorus. An ’80s break-up classic.

3. Oblivious (1983)
Summery, Flamenco-tinged pop gem that reached #18 in the UK singles chart. Frame works the minor/major thing beautifully (minor-key verse, major chorus), nails a very tricky acoustic guitar part and also pulls off the seldom-achieved trick of writing something catchy but not annoying.

2. Deep And Wide And Tall (1987)
Openly states the pressing question perhaps underlying all great pop music: are we going to live together? Roddy and producer Russ Titleman achieve the Scritti groove sought throughout the Love album. A mixture of spine-tingling backing vocals and major-seventh chords fuse to gorgeous effect. Inexplicably reached a lowly #87 in the UK.

1. Working In A Goldmine (1987)
Roddy’s ‘blue-eyed-soul’ period wasn’t an outright success but this shimmering ballad with its fine Rob Mounsey arrangement is a standout. Seemingly about the unknowability of a lover (‘We love/What shines/Before our eyes/Why can’t we learn/What hides?’), it features one of the most sublime middle-eights (or, more accurately, middle-sixes) of late-’80s pop.