"Suddenly It's Tuesday" - Part 7 (121-140)

 

Still not too much controversy last week. Surprisingly - to me, anyway - the biggest outcry was around 'Mars Sparkles Down On Me' being too low (although a couple of people also suggested it was too high).

A few people have asked about the process I used to arrive at the rankings. Before I explain, I should reiterate what I said in the introductory post, i.e. that I recognise the superficial and subjective nature of the task, but hopefully it's a bit of fun for TWP fans to engage with and also something that promotes the band's work. 

Several months ago, I set about compiling a definitive list of TWP songs, using the knowledge of those on Scopitones and the 'Barmy Army' Facebook page to fine tune it. The first step was to go through the list, simply giving a 'gut feeling' mark out of ten to each song. I then made a playlist of the 10s, one of the 9s, and so on. I would spend a couple of days with, say, the 7/10 playlist on repeat/shuffle and then put the 7s in order. Occasionally, I would realise a song was in the wrong category and promote/relegate it accordingly.

Once I'd done that, I stuck them all together into one big playlist. In the weeks before I started the blog, I listened to this 'big list' (on shuffle) regularly. Each time a new song started (most of the time, anyway - I was occasionally doing other things as well!) I glanced at its placing to see if it felt right. If it didn't, I played a few songs from that section of the list to determine if the one in question needed to move. Once I found that I was satisfied with where everything was appearing, I started writing...

I have started compiling a YouTube playlist of all of the tracks (in reverse order) which I'll update as I go along. If you don't like the order, remember you could always play it on shuffle!

 140 One Day This Will All Be Yours 

(B-side of Kennedy, 1989)

A restrained barrage of urgent acoustic chords and rolling drums that only just makes it past the two minute mark. There are some interesting layers of sound - especially in the second half, where an unearthly drone enters the fray - but its brevity leaves you with the impression of an underdeveloped fragment. Features the peculiar lyric: 'on that fateful day the budgie had a stroke / 1940s bliss / how could it come to this?' Decent enough b-side, but no more than that.

139 You Can't Moan, Can You? 

(George Best, 1987)

The first appearance for a George Best song. Although it features an admirably chunky bass line and pleasing mix of fuzzy/scratchy guitar, it lollops along a little sluggishly. 'I was just trying to hide a yawn / I think I’ve noticed that its dawn' is a nicely wry opening line, but the lyric rather runs out of steam, simply repeating 'you have got everything that you need' for what ends up feeling like rather a long time.

138 Every Mother's Son

(B-side of My Favourite Dress, 1987)

Bristling with nervous energy, this concise (96 seconds) blast of indie-garage-punk rattles along at a furious tempo. It's a rather perplexing lyric about maternal relationships: 'a woman’s got to have her mother’s boy so that her man is on his own'. 

137 Stop Thief

(Valentina, 2012)

An atmospheric if slightly ponderous slow-burn number, addressed to the man who's stealing the object of the narrator's affections away from him. The quieter sections benefit from a simple but mesmerising melody, and Gedge packs some emotional punch in the final line, 'there’s really not much left to lose'. The instrumental climax, however, is a little hesitant (Charlie's drum fills, unusually, feel somehow just off the pace) and overly restrained; it might have been better to either conclude gently at 2:54 or give the final passage a bit more oomph.

136 Where Everybody Knows Your Name (Theme from 'Cheers')

(B-side of Montreal, 1997)

Always an enjoyable singalong when performed live, the studio version is shambolic but fun.

135 Getting Nowhere Fast

(B-side of Anyone Can Make A Mistake, 1987)

A cover of Girls At Our Best!'s 1980 debut single. TWP's version lacks the subtlety of the original's off-hand post-punk angularity, but you can't fault it for energy; they rip through it at a breakneck speed that suggests they only had a couple of minutes of studio time left.

134 (The Moment Before) Everything's Spoiled Again

(B-side of Go Out And Get 'Em Boy!, 1985)

A giddy whirl of serrated chords and shifts in melody and tempo; the 25-year-old Gedge was clearly bursting with ideas and here seems to try and cram three or four songs into one track. Whilst 'Spoiled' is full of invention and heartfelt emotion, youthful exuberance triumphs at the expense of coherence. It also sounds like it was recorded on a dictaphone in a shed. 

Still, there's a lot to like about the song's abandoned recklessness and the desperate longing captured in Gedge's vocal. Opening line 'Have I said something wrong? / How can I know if you’re not going to speak to me?' set a template for many of TWP's 80s lyrics.

133 Hand In Glove

(Please Please Please: A Tribute To The Smiths, 2011)

Some artists are just difficult to cover successfully. The Fall are a prime example: consider, for example, this utter abomination. The Smiths are another. To be fair, there are a few half-decent attempts on this compilation, but there are also several poor ones, such as 'Half A Person' and 'Sheila Take A Bow'.

TWP's 'Hand In Glove', however, is a winner. Reworking the song as a doomy, distorted MBV-style drone, with Gedge contributing an unfamiliar querulous quasi-falsetto, somehow, against all odds, just works.

132 Kittery

(Going, Going..., 2016)

Of the four instrumentals that open Going, Going..., 'Kittery' works best as a stand-alone track. A gradual build, reminiscent of Mogwai, eventually erupts into a heavy, thunderous crescendo accented with spookily whirling keyboards. (Kittery is in York County, Maine.)

131 No

(Bizarro, 1989)

Pleasant but predictable jangle about post-infidelity recriminations. 'If you’re as sorry as you say / why didn’t you just say no?' doesn't make a lot of sense chronologically, but the biggest problem with the song is that, after a minute or so, you know exactly what the rest of it is going to sound like. Nice enough, but b-side material really.

130 England

(Home Internationals EP, 2017)

Post-rock was a genre that emerged in the late 90s, characterised by lengthy, instrumental pieces that tended to expand slowly on melodic themes and often relied on bombastic crescendos. As is often the case with these things, most of the bands that are identified as post-rock eschew the label, but among the best examples are Mogwai, Explosions In The Sky and This Will Destroy You.

When I first heard Going, Going..., one of the first things that struck me was that the opening quartet of instrumentals had a bit of a post-rock flavour. I spoke to Gedge after TWP's gig at Cardiff Tramshed in 2016 (if you've never been to a TWP gig, I should point out that this isn't name dropping - post-gig, David is very amenable and happy to chat to pretty much anyone) and asked him if he'd been influenced by post-rock artists whilst recording Going, Going... He paused for a moment, before replying 'no'.

Well, whatever he says, there certainly seems to be a bit of post-rock influence lurking in the subsequent Home Internationals EP. Spoken word snippets are a common post-rock trope, and here they're supplied by poet Simon Armitage (you can read the full text here). 'England' is framed around a gently repetitive arpeggio that eventually explodes into crunchy, distorted chords and some surprisingly bluesy soloing from Patrick Alexander. 

129 Scotland

(Home Internationals EP, 2017)

Similar to 'England', but also throws in some sweeping strings.

128 Larry's

(Take Fountain, 2005)

Like 'Swingers' from El Rey, 'Larry's' is one of the handful of TWP album tracks that have never been played live. It's easy to see why: a large proportion of the song is slow, fragile and sparse; you can imagine the audience, keen to hear 'Brassneck' and 'Kennedy', chattering over it (a fate that often befell 'Mars Sparkles Down On Me').

The poignant melody is used to relate the melancholy tale of a man who mistakes a random stranger in the supermarket for his ex-lover (of eighteen years, which is an oddly specific timescale). His obsession leads him to return repeatedly to the scene of this encounter. 

It's really rather touching. However, whilst Terry's backing vocals add drama, the more forceful sections don't quite attain the sweeping romanticism they're aiming for; in places (e.g. at 2:28) the song becomes slightly ponderous.

127 Big Boots

(Saturnalia, 1996)

Almost as fragile and delicate as 'Larry's', 'Big Boots' is also rather hazy and lethargic; at times it sounds as if at least half of the band are on the verge of losing interest and just walking off. Despite this, there's something rather affecting about its glassy diffidence. The ghostly 'you scare me stiff' backing vocal is hauntingly touching, and there's a lovely, hesitant fuzz-guitar solo at the song's conclusion.

126 You Jane

(Valentina, 2012)

The verse's urgent guitar riff provides the song with an edgy, nervous energy; the thrashy chorus ('don’t come crying to me') breaks the tension with exuberance. What lets the song down slightly are the two rather cheesy down-tempo interludes, where Gedge seems hell-bent on cramming in as many old-school Hollywood stars as possible (Bogart, Bacall, Gable, Lombard) - you might have thought that Cinerama had got all of that out of his system.

125 Unfaithful 

(B-side of Kennedy, 1989)

Although there's a nice contrast between the crisp, almost flamenco-style guitar and the deep, ponderous bass line, the verse is just a touch plodding. Things pick up when the second guitar kicks in, however. A typical early-Gedge story of obsessive jealousy, it includes the classic line, 'I haven’t worn a shirt like that since... oh, 1974'.

124 Thanks

(Bizarro, 1989)

Whilst most of its second half is majestic, Bizarro's first side feels a little uncertain, as if the group are still trying to get to grips with how to move on from George Best. 'Thanks' - a typical tale of envious recriminations regarding an ex-lover and her new boyfriend ('his head’s been on the pillows that I bought') - is full of furious energy, but flails around somewhat aimlessly. As the NME said at the time, it's the sound of TWP treading water when they should have been walking on it.

123 Three

(Single, 1992)

The weakest of the dozen 1992 'Hit Parade' singles, 'Three' is decent enough - the grimy guitar arpeggio that runs through it is pretty engaging, and the melody has a certain melancholy charm - but ultimately it's a little one-paced and forgettable. Not an especially inspiring lyric either: 'Two’s company but three have a better time / we’ve got a mountain to climb / we’re going to have a good time / and it isn’t a crime'.

122 Montreal

(Saturnalia, 1996)

Another song framed around a looping guitar arpeggio, although this time much lighter in tone. Pleasant enough, if a little lightweight and unfocused. Not the most believable lyric: he's about to ask her to move in with him; she says no thanks, I'm off to live in Canada. Gedge seems to have been rather fond of the song: in the years following the post-Cinerama TWP reformation, it seemed to make innumerable live appearances, many of the audience using it as an opportunity for a comfort break (cf 'Mars Sparkles Down On Me'). I'm not sure what the hell is going on with Gedge's hair in the video.

121 Model, Actress, Whatever...

(El Rey, 2008)

Musically, this works well: the verse is taut and almost menacing; the bridge makes for a measured lull before a soaring chorus which is rounded off (the first time round) by a brief passage of thunderous chords. The second trip around concludes with an abandoned coda with a touch of wah-wah. What lets the song down is the lyric. A story of online obsession ('when I stare at you / okay, it’s just a jpeg - I have a few'; 'I’ll be here, still just watching...'), it makes Gedge sound unfortunately like a perv who lives in his parents' basement.

Many thanks, as ever, for taking the time to read, comment and share.

Take care, and I'll see you in a week's time.

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