With Just A Hint Of Mayhem

Music reviews, gig reviews, fun trivia and extra added random stuff!

“It shakes all over like a jelly fish, I kinda like it” July 24, 2009


Hello dear readers I’m back with another post and firstly I would like to say thank you to everyone who has read any of my blog posts. The total number of views reached 100,000 yesterday. Now that gives no clue as to how many ‘regulars’ there are out there so if you are a regular reader I would love to hear from you. (Mickey G you’re welcome to respond to this, but I know you’re a regular!)

Anyway as the number of views has hit six digits for the first time I thought I’d include a few statistics, wow how exciting does that sound……..NOT! But I’m going to do it anyway. Firstly the artists that most people have searched for and found there way to my blog are;

kate is in fact top of the class and definitely not a dunce. She is just borrowing Robbie Williams' hat :-)

Kate is in fact top of the class and definitely not a dunce. She is just borrowing Robbie Williams' hat 🙂

1 Kate Bush, 2 Pink Floyd, 3 Lily Allen, 4 Jackson Five, 5 Slipknot, 6 Iggy Pop, 7 Beatles, 8 Catwoman, 9 Michael Jackson and 10 Green Day This ranges from more than 10,000 hits for Kate and the Floyd and 1,400 for Green Day

Lily uses her new eco friendly banana microphone

Lily uses her new eco friendly banana microphone

Of course some of you may be familiar with the ‘Lily Allen Naked’ experiment we undertook here (if you’re not then check out the tags). The principle was not to lower the tone far enough to show any tabloid style naked pictures of the wonderfully talented Miss Allen, but simply to see how many people arrived here by using Lily Allen Naked as a search term. I can confirm that 220 people have done that. In a couple of strangely related incidents though 253 have searched for Ronan Keating Naked and a further 205 people for Eminem naked. There were also a handful of searches for Kate Bush naked and perhaps I shouldn’t mention the 4 people who searched for Meatloaf naked! (But for those who did search for Meatloaf Naked check the picture below, it’s just for you 😉

Meatloaf Naked, well there's no gravy on it is there?

Meatloaf Naked, well there's no gravy on it is there?

And finally for the stats the most viewed links from the blog have been Steal The Smile (my son’s excellent band – click their name to check them out!), Kate Bush’s “Wuthering Heights” video and Wyclef’s “Stripper Song” video with 34, 26 and 19 views respectively. Catwoman asked me to point out that she loves statistics or maybe she said that she didn’t 😉

OK I’ve bored you enough withnumbers so let’s move on to some hopefully more interesting stuff. Firstly an item from yesterdays newspapers in the UK. A 46 year old Alice Cooper fan was fined £250 and also received a suspended jail term and a 3 month curfew order. He apparently removed his prosthetic leg and waved it around at Alice’s gig in the Southampton Guildhall. One member of the audience tried to stop him and was beaten up. To me this almost sounds like it could have been part of the one time Vincent Furnier’s act. Here is the link to the story in the Daily Telegraph. Let me know what you think of it.

Alice warns the unruly fan that if he hit's anyone esle with his false leg he'll cut the other one off too!

Alice warns the unruly fan that if he hits anyone else with his false leg he'll cut the other one off too!

Also in the news yesterday was the legendary (in my opinion) Mick Jones off of the Clash. He has opened a library/ exhibition of a stacks of his Clash memorabilia, clothing  and various other personal items. He calls it ‘one big living artwork’ Read about it here on Spinner.com. I would love to visit but I’m not sure I’ll be able to make it

Either Mick now runs a newspaper stand or this is some of his collection

Either Mick now runs a newspaper stand or this is some of his collection

Morrissey played at the Brixton Academy a few days ago and this is the film and music he played before he came on stage, bloody brilliant in my opinion! Did you guess the music? It’s “Lighten Up Morrissey” by Sparks! And for the hell of it here are the excellent Flaming Lips with a wonderful cover version of Madonna’s “Borderline” I would like to thank those wonderful folks at Mojo Magazine for pointing me to those two

Here’s a great blog for you, I know it’s not music related but I thought it was bloody funny it’s called Kemp Folds and features pictures of Ross Kemp off of Eastenders (aka Grant Mitchell) that have been folded. OK I know that sounds stupid but check it out by clicking here

Let’s finish today July 24th with a few ‘onthisdays’. firstly on this very day in 1967 all four of the Beatles and their then manager the late great (l’s & g’s are back ra ra ra) Brian Epstein signed a petition printed in The Times newspaper which called for the legalisation of cannabis. Well it seems like no one listened doesn’t it? Where can you use marijuana legally now apart from Amsterdam Coffee Shops?

On this day in 1997 Liam Gallagher off of Oasis was given a caution by police after admitting he had caused criminal damage following an altercation with a cyclist in Camden, London. Liam was travelling in a chauffeur-driven car (it’s a tough life being a rock star isn’t it?) when he grabbed the cyclist through the car window and broke his Ray Bans. Do you remember when Ray Bans were THE fashion item? There not as big these days are they? Anyway sticking with Oasis, when Noel Gallagher was the guitar tech for the Inspiral Carpets. The Carpets used to call him “Cot Death” because he slept so much.

I thought this was quite amusing. Thank you to Snipes.com

I thought this was quite amusing. Thank you to Snipes.com

And finally for the ‘onthisdays’ today we go back to 2002. A garden centre was sued by the late great (l & g’sback with a vengeance) Freddie Mercury’s former partner Mary Austin. the law suit accused Clifton Nurseries of killing a collection of Freddie’s prized Koi Fish. Austin had inherited the collection on his death. The claim was that 84 fish died when a the electricity which supplied power to the fishes environment (a temporary pond apparently) was accidentally turned off by a worker at the Garden Centre in Maida Vale, London. Apparently by the time he died Freddie had built up one of the biggest Koi collections in the UK. These are not the sort of fish you’d find in your local fish and chip shop, one Koi can be worth as much as £250,000.

Imagine that Battered Koi, Large Chips and Mushy Peas ...... mmmmmmmm :-)

Imagine that Battered Koi, Large Chips and Mushy Peas ...... mmmmmmmm 🙂

To finish let me say thank you once again to everyone who has stopped at this blog occasionally, visited regularly, read it, commented, clicked on the links or simply looked at the pictures! And as this has been a statistics lead numbers post here is a link to the wonderful “Living By Numbers” from New Musik

 

“Giant steps are what you take” July 20, 2009


One simple footprint which for me says so very much

One simple footprint which for me says so very much

Greetings fellow astronuts and space cadets! As most of you know I come in peace, but I’m not that interested in meeting your leader ok. I’m not particularly sure that I’d like to take over the planet either! Anyway enough blathering on, I simply could not let this momentous occasion go without a mention, even in a humble music blog. It’s July 20th today and 40 years ago two men landed on the moon; Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin and do not forget Michael Collins who piloted Columbia the Command Module which remained in orbit around the moon while Armstrong and Aldrin took the Eagle the Lunar Module to the surface.

The crew of Apollo 11 chose this, did you notice that the Eagle that represents America carries an olive branch representing peace?

The crew of Apollo 11 chose this, did you notice that the Eagle that represents America carries an olive branch representing peace?

In my opinion this is undoubtedly the greatest achievement of my 50 years on the planet. When I was a boy I wanted to be an astronaut, but then I guess millions of others did too. I wonder if as many people want that now? I hope so. My Mum and Dad were quite strict about my bedtime and I was only 10 years old in 1969 so it was amazing that my Dad let me stay up or woke me up in the early hours so that I didn’t miss anything. In those days I collected anything to do with the Apollo missions; newspapers, magazines, models, a massive poster of the moon and countless things that have disappeared from my memory. I did have an Airfix scale model of the Saturn V rocket and another of the Lunar Module. The latter was incredibly difficult to put together!

It looks like a Blue Peter project really doesn't it?

It looks like a Blue Peter project really doesn't it?

We sent a further six missions to the moon and in addition to Aldrin and Armstrong a further 10 men walked on it’s surface. I am still saddened that we haven’t really done much in the way of manned planetary exploration since Apollo 17 in 1973. I would love to think we could make it to Mars within my lifetime.

The Lunar Module leaves the moon and returns to the Command Module for the return to Earth

The Lunar Module leaves the moon and returns to the Command Module for the return to Earth

Let me briefly address those who say the moon landings were faked, in my opinion those people are talking complete crap. There is plenty of information around that debunks all those moon landing hoax theories. I won’t bore you with the details here, but to those who believe the conspiracy stuff please say hi to Elvis and Jacko from me when you next see them in the 7-11

Probably the most iconic picture of their time on the moon this is Aldrin snapped by Armstrong and is often known as the visor shot for what you can see reflected in Buzz's visor

Probably the most iconic picture of their time on the moon this is Aldrin snapped by Armstrong and is often known as the visor shot for what you can see reflected in Buzz's visor

In the UK the Apollo 11 mission was also important for a certain Mr Bowie. He got his first hit single out of it when the BBC used his “Space Oddity” as the theme for their coverage. It reached number 5 in the UK charts in 1969 and eventually made number one when it was reissued in 1975. That song is in fact reissued today in a format which also provides you with each separately recorded track to enable you to remix it yourself. I for one will be buying it later! Appropriately(ish) enough Thunderclap Newman’s “Something In The Air” was number one in the UK at the time of the Apollo 11 moon landing.

Neil Armstrong's Space Suit........ or perhaps it was Major Tom's?

Neil Armstrong's Space Suit........ or perhaps it was Major Tom's?

So without further ado here is a small hit parade of Moon related songs, well this is a music blog after all!

1 “Space Oddity” – David Bowie (come on I’m a fan what did you expect!)

2 “Saturn V” – Inspiral Carpets (what a glorious sight that rocket was)

3 “Sleeping Satellite”  – Tasmin Archer (this song appears to express the sadness that I feel about us never having gone back to our sleeping satellite)

4 “Walking On The Moon” – Police (Ok now we’re onto gratuitous use of moon in the song!)

5 “Fly Me To The Moon” – Frank Sinatra (How could I not include this fabulous song?)

OK that’s my five moon related songs, I’m sure that you have plenty more, so tell me what they are!

In the meantime click here to enjoy some of the BBC’s coverage of the 40th Anniversary of Apollo 11’s historic mission.

 

“Are you ready, are you ready for this, are you hanging on the edge of your seat?” July 18, 2009


Hello once again dear readers today is the 19th July and it is the 62nd birthday of one Brian Harold May off of Queen. Brian still uses his ‘Red Special’ guitar which he began building in the early sixties with his Dad Harold. It is principally made from an old 18th Century fireplace mantel. Also there are actually two wormholes in the neck of the guitar, at least according to Wikipedia. Presumably not the type of wormholes that Brian would know more about, being an astrophysicist! To learn more about those type of wormholes click here. If your interests are a little more down to earth and you’d like a guitar just like (well ok similar) to Brian’s, then click here.

Brian poses with the famouse fireplace :-)

Brian poses with the famouse fireplace 🙂

Brian auditions Anita Dobson as a lookalike for security purposes

Brian auditions Anita Dobson as a lookalike for security purposes

On this day in 1980 the very band that Brian found fame in, Queen racked up their third UK number one album with ‘The Game’. This album featured the single “Another One Bites The Dust” A great song in my opinion and this was apparently also the opinion of Michael Jackson who was a friend of Freddie Mercury. When Fred played the song to him Jacko insisted that the band release it as a single and the rest as they say is history! And just for fun here is the Weird Al Yankovic parody of the song “Another One Rides The Bus

Sadly both Michael and Freddie have now bitten the dust... RIP

Sadly both Michael and Freddie have now bitten the dust… RIP

Also on this day in 1958, whilst I was still in the womb, George Treadwell the then manager of the Drifters sacked the entire group. However he simply replaced them with another group, unkown at the time, Ben E King and the Five Crowns! If only someone would do that with the likes of Boyzone and Westlife. Oh I expect they probably have and no one has noticed! Here are Ben and the boys with “This Magic Moment” Incidentally fact fans did you know that the Shadows off of Cliff Richard and the Shadows were once called the Drifters? Well if you didn’t you do now!

By 1959 Ben E King clearly couldn't be bothered to tour. As for Dock Green is he anything to do with Dixon?

By 1959 Ben E King clearly couldn’t be bothered to tour. As for Dock Green is he anything to do with Dixon?

And the final ‘onthisday’ for 19th July is from 1989. Apparently when large amounts of money were found in the late great (those l & g’s are back!) James Brown’s prison cell he was moved from a minimum security prison to a medium security prison. What the hell is the difference between minimum and medium and then presumably maximum security prisons. “Get Up Offa That Thing” indeed! If that had happened these days it would have been the hidden stash of some jailed banker, but wait a minute none of them went to jail did they? They all recieved performance bonuses, how the hell does that work then? Here is James with the late great (back with a vengeance those ‘l & g’s’) Robert Palmer singing “I Feel Good

James moves from minimum to medium security with his personal banker!

James moves from minimum to medium security with his personal banker!

 

“My feet is my only carriage, so I’ve got to push on through” July 16, 2009


Hello good people and thank you for reading my blog, however you got here 🙂

I’ll kick off this post with yet another shameless plug for my son Luke’s band, Steal The Smile. They are playing at the SweatBox in Wantage tonight (17th July) and then on Friday 18th July they are playing at TheNet in Abingdon. Check out their MySpace page here. You will not be disappointed, these boys are bloody good!

And now on with the usual crap, a few ‘onthisdays’ for July 17th. Starting with those old fellas the Rolling Stones. On this day in 1972 a bomb exploded under their equipment van in Montreal, Canada. It was alleged to be the work of French Separatists. Presumably nothing to do with Mick’s alleged relationship with Pierre Trudeau’s wife then, but hey maybe that allegation came later! In addition to the bomb many angry fans rioted and threw bottles and bricks after it was discovered that there were around 3,000 forged tickets in circulation. Can’t get no satisfaction indeed! In the meantime check out the Stones with the classic “Angie

Well no wonder they were bombed, insulting a moose like this was the catalyst!

Well no wonder they were bombed, insulting a moose like this was the catalyst!

This day in 1975 was in my opinion highly historic as it was one of the nights that one of the greatest albums ever was recorded, well certainly the greatest live album anyway! Bob Marley and the Wailers played the firs of two nights at the Lyceum in good old London Town. Both shows were recorded and later released as the classic Marley album ‘Live’ later that year. For me it contains the definitive version of the undeniably brilliant “No Woman No Cry“, which is easily my favourite Marley song. I have worn out three copies of that album over the years, one on cassette and two on vinyl. I have t on CD now though!

“No Woman No Cry” was originally included on the excellent ‘Natty Dread’ album and many people assumed it was not written by Mr Marley, largely because the song is credited to a ‘V. Ford’. This is in fact one Vincent Ford who ran a soup kitchen in Trenchtown, Jamaica. He was a good friend of Bob’s and the royalties he  received enabled him to continue running that same soup kitchen for man years. I think that is a great gift to give, what do you think? Ford died a few months ago, click here for the BBC report of his death.

Bob was supposedly a talented footballer, but I bet he wouldn't have taken the Manchester City silver dollar!

Bob was supposedly a talented footballer, but I bet he wouldn’t have taken the Manchester City silver dollar!

The cover of my favourite Bob Marley album, go out and buy it now! That's an order!

The cover of my favourite Bob Marley album, go out and buy it now! That’s an order!

And finally for today I will feature someone who my regular readers will know that I don’t rate very highly at all……… Robbie Williams! On this day in 1995 he left Take That, bucket loads of tears were shed and the story even made all the main TV news shows. I mean come on it was hardly the Beatles breaking up or even Geri leaving the Spice Girls was it? Well ok maybe it was on a par with Geri’s departure. Robbie obviously went on to great success for a while and Take That eventually broke up. Now that Take That are back though our darling tabloids would have us believe that Robbie wants to rejoin. You know what? This is a big admission but I believe them for once 🙂 Anyway it does seem like they’re “Back For Good” doesn’t it?

See I always said that Robbie and the boys were just pants!

See I always said that Robbie and the boys were just pants!

 

“She tied my eyes with ribbon of a silken ghostly thread, I gazed with troubled vision on an old four poster bed” July 14, 2009


Hello again dear readers, I’m back with another small collection of ‘onthisdays’ today, this time for July 15th. I should warn you that this post does contain two pictures of naked women (well the same woman actually, Lady Madge). OK so now there are only 50% of readers left, the others have all paged down to the pictures let me say that this blog has a history of naked pics; there’s been Eminem, Ronan Keating and not Lily Allen, although we did run the Lily Allen Naked experiment, check the tags to find out more, but whatever you think you WILL NOT find proper naked pics of anyone here. But I’m sure that won’t stop you looking will it?

On this day in 1973 the Great Western Express Festival took place at White City in London. It sounds like it was sponsored by a train line or train company, does anyone know if that was the case? Anyway trains or no trains the line up included the Edgar Winter Group, Sly & the Family Stone, Canned Heat, Lindisfarne and the Kinks. It was at this White City show that Ray Davies off of the Kinks announced that he was sick of the whole thing and was retiring. He apparently then walked to the local hospital and collapsed, presumably when he saw the size of the queue (my American readers should replace queue with line!). Clearly he didn’t retire for long either.

This time the boys made certain that Ray couldn't leave by sitting on him

This time the boys made certain that Ray couldn’t leave by sitting on him

Lindisfarne who were also on the bill that day were particularly successful in the UK in the early 70’s having two UK top 10 hits in 1972 with “Meet Me On The Corner” and “Lady Eleanor“. Perhaps lesser known though is that the band’s Alan Jackson played the mandolin on Rod Stewart’s 1971 UK number one “Maggie May”. This part was once mimed on the BBC’s Top Of The Pops show by the greatest DJ that ever lived, the late great (hey welcome back l & g’s) Mr John Peel.

Clearly sharing the booze would be difficult with hardly any glasses. meet me on the corner and I'll give you some guys!

Clearly sharing the booze would be difficult with hardly any glasses. meet me on the corner and I’ll give you some guys!

It was on this very day in 1985 that nude photos of Madonna taken in 1977 appeared in both Playboy and Penthouse this month. I’m not sure whether she took any action but it was just a few years later that she launched her book ‘Sex’ containing naked and erotic pictures of herself. It was hardly pornographic although the price was somewhat obscene. Anyway here is Madge herself with “Erotica” and just remember guys it may make you go blind! You have been warned

Madonna shows the world her pussy.............................cat!

Madonna shows the world her pussy………………………..cat!

By the time Madonna published her 'Sex' book the need for Parental Advisory Style Stickers had become somewhat ridiculous

By the time Madonna published her ‘Sex’ book the need for Parental Advisory Style Stickers had become somewhat ridiculous

Back in 1998 on this day Aerosmith had to cancel an upcoming US tour after the band’s drummer Joey Kramer suffered a bizarre accident. His car caught fire and was destroyed completely as he was filling it up with petrol. he was admitted to hospital with second degree burns.

Joey soon realised that starting fires by rubbing his sticks together was much safer than starting fires in petrol/ gas stations

Joey soon realised that starting fires by rubbing his sticks together was much safer than starting fires in petrol/ gas stations

 

“I, I wish you could swim, like the dolphins, like dolphins can swim” July 13, 2009


Two posts in a row, wow I haven’t done that in ages! Just a few more ‘onthisdays’ today (July 13th) dear readers

Another entry for that bunch of pensionable rockers the Rolling Stones on this day in 1963 they played their first ever gig outside London. They appeared as the support band to the Hollies at the Alcove Club in Middlesborough in the north east of England.

Being in the Stones was becoming a bit of a drag these days

Being in the Stones was becoming a bit of a drag these days

On this day in 1965 Paul McCartney received five Ivor Novello awards at the Savoy in London, he arrived late as he had apparently forgotten about the engagement. John Lennon refused to attend, presumably in protest at something! Sticking with the Beatles on this day in 1969 the band’s single “The Ballad Of John And Yoko” was banned by more than 100 US Radio Stations because it contained what US Radio authorities saw as offensive in the line “Christ you know it ain’t easy”. Bloody hell these guys were easily offended weren’t they?

Despite being given a piggy-back from Paul John still couldn't be bothered to turn up at the Novello Awards

Despite being given a piggy-back from Paul John still couldn’t be bothered to turn up at the Novello Awards

July 13th 1997 saw Anthony Kiedis off of the Red Hot Chilli Peppers undergo five hours of surgery after a serious motorbike accident.I recently read Kiedis’ superb autobiography entitled ‘Scar Tissue’ it is one of the most brutally honest rock biographies I have ever read. He deals very openly with his addictions and relationships. I never knew much about him before I read the book and now I have immense respect for him. If you read no other music books, read this one! Incidentally in the book he describes how it took five doses of morphine to kill the pain from the motorbike accident, largely due to an intolerance built up from prolonged heroin use. Anyway here are the RHCP’s with “Scar Tissue” live from Slane Castle in Dublin, well not actually live this one hot minute but obviously live when it was recorded!

After his motorbike mishap Anthony took to riding bikes without engines, I wonder if he used stabiliser wheels too?

After his motorbike mishap Anthony took to riding bikes without engines, I wonder if he used stabiliser wheels too?

On this day in 1985 Duran Duran became the first artists to have a US number one single with a James Bond theme when they reached the top of the pile with “A View To A Kill“. Personally I thought that their performance of the song at Live Aid was abysmal, which brings us to………..

Andy Taylor and Simon LeBon argue over which one of them was the most crap at Live Aid

Andy Taylor and Simon LeBon argue over which one of them was the most crap at Live Aid

……… on this day in 1985 at 12.01 UK time Status Quo kicked off the Live Aid extravaganza which was largely put together by Bob Geldof and raised millions for famine relief in Africa. It was a joint event where Quo kicked off at Wembley Stadium, the US show was at the JFK Stadium in Philadelphia. The shows were viewed by more than 1.5 billion people in 160 countries (that is quite a bit more than view my blog each day!). For me the best performances on the day were Queen, U2 and David Bowie (well I would say Bowie wouldn’t I?) Here is Mr Bowie with “Heroes” from that very show! Incidentally Bowie gave up one of his song slots to air a hard hitting video of the famine victims in Africa which was soundtracked by the song “Drive” from the Cars. It was truly heartbreaking. What were your own favourite memories of Live Aid? Were you there?

Chas and Di realise that they are a week early for the Polo and Equestrian finals when they see the Quo on stage

Chas and Di realise that they are a week early for the Polo and Equestrian finals when they see the Quo on stage

 

“Can hear me, can you hear me, through the dark night far away” July 11, 2009


Hello once again good people I thought I’d try and sneak in a few posts in the vein I started this blog, so here for you regular readers are a bunch of ‘onthisdays’ To those non regular or new readers these are snippets of music trivia that took place on this very day. The day in question today is July 12th

On this day in 1954 a very young Elvis Presley, just 19 years old in fact resigned from his job as a truck driver with the Crown Electric Company. The day was made much more important by the fact that Mr Presley also signed a contract with Sun Records

Even after he hit the big time Elvis refused to give up truck driving, although he did insist on using a customised rig ;-)

Even after he hit the big time Elvis refused to give up truck driving, although he did insist on using a customised rig 😉

On this day in 1962 Ray Charles was sitting at the top of the UK singles chart with the excellent “I Can’t Stop Loving You” I heard this a lot as a child as it was a great favourite of my parents. It was also one of the songs my Mum selected to have played at my Dad’s funeral in 2001. Another song played that day, was a massive favourite of my Dad, it was Rod Stewart’s excellent version of Gavin Sutherland off of the Sutherland Brothers’ “Sailing” Even now that song brings a tear to my eye, probably because it never fails to evoke memories of my Dad, a wonderful man who will always be missed. So dear readers tell me what songs make you cry and what your story is. In the meantime click here to see Rod singing “Sailing”. This one’s for you Dad!

Ray was somewhat annoyed with the road crew who had rather hastily removed his piano before he'd even had the chance to tell them to 'Hit The Road Jack'

Ray was somewhat annoyed with the road crew who had rather hastily removed his piano before he’d even had the chance to tell them to ‘Hit The Road Jack’

Also that same day in 1962 saw the live debut of a group you probably all know, it was at the Marquee Club in London and the group was the Rolling Stones. It was a bit of a different line up though, featuring Dick Taylor on Bass and Mick Avory on Drums. The band were actually billed as Mick Jagger and the Rolling Stones, I bet Keef and Brian weren’t happy with that (assuming they were a part of the group at that stage). They were paid the princely sum of £20 for the gig. A figure that might just about buy you a programme from a more recent Stones show

Mick thought he looked the business in his new jacket, the rest of the band thought less business and more.......twat!

Mick thought he looked the business in his new jacket, the rest of the band thought less business and more…….twat!

I suppose todays final ‘onthisday’ is still somewhat topical. On this day in 1988 Michael Jackson arrived in the UK for his first ever solo appearances in this country. He had appeared many times before with his brothers but never alone. He played eight nights to nearly 800,000 people and apparently grossed around £13 million. So even before Thriller he was able to earn big bucks! Here he is performing “Wanna Be Starting Something” on the Bad Tour from 1987

Clearly Michael intended to travel very light for his first solo UK tour. Well if you wanna be starting something you might as well wanna be starting it well ;-)

Clearly Michael intended to travel very light for his first solo UK tour. Well if you wanna be starting something you might as well wanna be starting it well 😉

To finish todays post I want to share this excellent Evian advert with you. I believe it’s called ‘Roller Babies’ and it is soundtracked by the fabulous “Rappers Delight” by the Sugarhill Gang. Click here to view it

 

“I like to see you, but then again, that doesn’t mean you mean that much to me” June 30, 2009


Today’s post may be somewhat random in terms of content but you know what? That’s how I like it!

Some of you may know that I travel down south every Monday morning from York on the 6 a.m. train to London. This means that I get up at 5 a.m. Whay am I telling you this in a music blog? Well last Sunday night I went to bed around 11pm and some inconsiderate muppet (apologies to Mr Henson) at the end of the street decided to play what seemed like his entire collection of Shirley Bassey songs at high volume until almost 2 am. In between songs he could be heard discussing, again at great volume, the death of Michael Jackson. Things like “He’s all over the bloody papers and TV, I mean what’s that all about, he’s just a fookin’ pervy freak” Well Mr Noisemaker that may well have been true, but it’s clear that you are a completely inconsiderate bastard. I was going to come and knock on your door that night, but I doubt that you would have heard me. So I opted for a cunning plan. It was me who banged on your door Monday morning at 5.20 am while I was waiting for my taxi. I was disappointed that you didn’t answer, but oh how pleased I was when I looked back as the cab turned the corner to see you stepping out of your door with a very tired and puzzled expression. What would I have given for your door to slam shut behind you at that point. If there is any chance that you read this post, just be aware that I will do the same thing again if you persist in disturbing the neighbourhood in the same way again. You are obviously a Shirley bassey fan, so here is a few snippets of trivia about dame Shirley. Did you know that she is the only person to record more than one James Bond theme? Well it’s true and she actually recorded three; “Goldfinger” from 1963, “Diamonds Are Forever” from 1973 and “Moonraker” from 1979. Incidentally “Moonraker” was written for Johnny Mathis, well it’s your loss Johnny! She became a Dame Of The British Empire (DBE) in 1999. When Dame Shirley appeared at Glastonbury in 2005 the Arctic Monkeys played a cover of “Diamonds Are Forever” in her honour. Her vocals were also sampled by Kanye West on his hit “Diamonds From Sierra Leone” I bet you can’t guess which of her songs he sampled? 😉 She will be 72 in December which makes her old enough to be my Mum. My very own mother was 73 in February this year and in my opinion a certainty to reach triple figures

🙂

Dame Shirley enters the mud wrestling ring at Glastonbury in 2005

Dame Shirley enters the mud wrestling ring at Glastonbury in 2005

Many of you are aware that my son Luke is in a truly brilliant band called Steal The Smile and if you’re not then you clearly haven’t been reading my posts regularly enough. Anyway Steal The Smile have a new single out tomorrow 1st July. So get yourself over to their MySpace page and buy it and tell them I sent you! It’s called “Rome Was Built To Burn” and they are doing some gigs to promote it, including one at the FaceBar in Reading this Thursday (2nd July). So get yourself down there, you won’t be disappointed! Click here to visit their MySpace page

Gig poster for the mighty Steal The Smiles single launch party at the FaceBar in Reading Thursday July 2nd 2009. Be there or be Rhomboid

Gig poster for the mighty Steal The Smiles single launch party at the FaceBar in Reading Thursday July 2nd 2009. Be there or be Rhomboid

And finally, let’s get back to the kind of stuff that I published when I first kicked off this here blog back in February. On this day in  1975, 10CC were at No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘I’m Not In Love’. The instrumental break featured the repeated spoken phrase: ‘Be quiet, big boys don’t cry…’, which resonated with a sixteen year old me and was spoken by Kathy Warren, the receptionist at Strawberry Studios, Stockport, Cheshire where the band recorded the track. Apparently Jonathan King ‘discoverd’ Ten cc and came up with their name, allegedly the average male’s ejaculate adds up to 9cc……… well you can guess the rest. Jonathan also claims to have discovered Genesis and now he is in jail for kiddie fiddling which he denies, so what are we to believe? well good people I’ll leave that up to you!

kevin Godley was somewhat miffed that the other band members hadn't told him about the shave your beard off for charity gig they had recently played

kevin Godley was somewhat miffed that the other band members hadn’t told him about the shave your beard off for charity gig they had recently played

 

“Eat your words but don’t go hungry, words have always nearly hung me” June 12, 2009


Hello once again dear readers. Did you read the news that according to an American company the one millionth English word is about to be born, well actually it is probably already filling nappies (or diapers if you wish) as we speak. Apparently a company called GLM based in Texas whose raison-daitre is to tell companies how many times they are mentioned on the Internet can also search for the appearance of any word. Their self created methodology in determining a new word says that it must have appeared 25,000 times on the Internet, there is no time period applied. This all seems somewhat like bollocks to me (I’m not swearing bollocks is an Anglo Saxon word, just ask the Sex Pistols and Virgin Records!). Many Lexicographers (now that’s a fantastic job title!) are unhappy with these colonial usurpers telling them how it’s done! I tend to agree, but only because most Americans don’t speak English ‘like what it is supposed to be spoken’ I mean come on, no ‘U’ in colour, pronouncing route incorrectly, then there’s schedule and tomato. Don’t even get me started on fanny OK! 😉 Seriously though please don’t take offence at this if you are American, feel free to take offense though 🙂 But if you’d like a slightly more serious view click here for the link to the BBC that carries the story. Then click here for the follow up, for indeed while I have been typing (admittedly it has taken nearly three days to complete this post!) the new word has been dumped kicking and screaming into a world that, frankly, neither wants it or needs it. Only a nerdy geek could have given birth to it. For I know the word and the word is……………… Web 2.0, I kid you not. The nearest rivals were Jai-Ho (from the Slumdog Millionaire movie) and nOOB (something to do with nerdy, geeky gamers I believe) All that hype and all we get is a couple of small turds plopping into the lexicon of life.

Anyway I was thinking that a word related post might be interesting so here goes. Let’s kick off with the rather stupendous Tom Tom Club with the rather jolly “Wordy Rappinghood” Now I think Rappinghood would have made an excellent millionth word contender, how about you? Tom Tom Club I suppose really began as on offshoot of Talking Heads, I think nowadays the correct term might be side project! The band consisted of Tina Weymouth and Chris Frantz off of Talking Heads and a cast of many other noted musicians; Adrian Belew, Wally Badarou and the Compass Point All Stars to name just a few. Their earliest success came with the divine “Genius Of Love”. But they really broke big when the 12 inch versions of Genius and Rappinghood were issued and got a lot of club play in 1982. Their songs have been sampled by many people including Grandmaster Flash and Mariah Carey. The band also appeared on the Talking Heads live concert movie ‘Stop Making Sense’

camouflage was not that well understood by Tom Tom Club

camouflage was not that well understood by Tom Tom Club

Next up it’s the Gibb Brothers (OK the Bee Gees then) with “Words” Which was once given a depressingly dull makeover by the band that put bland into everything the rather shite (in my opinion of course) Boyzone. Sadly it gave Ronan and the boys their first UK number one. But if you’d like to hear some better covers of the song there are plenty out there. Check out some good covers from Rita Coolidge and Georgie Fame. You can find a great Bee Gees reference in the strangest place, there is an excellent parody of them in Blink 182’s video for “First Date” Speaking of the Bee Gees , I was walking to the train station earlier this week lost in my iPod and on came “Stayin’ Alive”, how I longed to be carrying a pot of paint so that I could make like Travolta’s Tony Manero in ‘Saturday Night Fever’. Sadly a laptop bag just doesn’t cut it, does it?

The Gibb boys prepare for the Christmas number one by wrapping themselves in Bacofoil like Turkeys

The Gibb boys prepare for the Christmas number one by wrapping themselves in Bacofoil like Turkeys

Then we have the boys that put Cod Piece back in the dictionary, Cameo with “Word Up” Which bizarrely in my humble opinion was covered by Korn! Click here to here the Korn version. The song was a massive hit for Cameo in 1986, the promo rounds were probably made much more memorable by Larry Blackmon’s polished red cod piece. For me Larry was one of only two people who have ever been able to pull off a cod piece (ooooooooh Matron!) The other one being Edmund Blackadder. The song also gets played in an Episode of the Simpsons entitled, appropriately for this post, ‘Homer and Lisa Exchange Cross Words’ where Lisa performs in a crossword competition.

Mr Cod Piece 1986

Mr Cod Piece 1986

I haven’t mentioned the Beatles and Bowie for a while so how about the Beatles with “The Word” and Mr Bowie with the hardly ever played “Word On A Wing”. The Beatles song appeared on ‘Rubber Soul’ and in addition to the Fab Four also had George Martin playing the Harmonium. Bowie’s song appeared on the excellent ‘Station To Station’ album from 1976 and emanating from the Dame’s ‘Thin White Duke’ period. It was also a B side to the single version of “Stay” from the same album. It is a relatively religious song and written while Bowie was very much coke addled. It also coincided with the time Mr Jones began to wear a crucifix

John you may have more friends than me, but at least mine isn't a midget!

John you may have more friends than me, but at least mine isn’t a midget!

I shall finish this post with the wonderful “ABC” by the Jackson Five. OK I know it’s not strictly a word but if you didn’t know your ABC you wouldn’t be able to make words would you? The song was a US number one and like the earlier “I Want You Back” was written by the mysterious Corporation. Not that mysterious though it was a Motown writing team that consisted of Berry Gordy, Freddie Perren, Alphonso Mizell and Deke Richards. The song was backed with a cover of a lesser known Diana Ross And The Supremes song; “The Young Folks”

Before they could afford a tour bus the boys used alternative transport

Before they could afford a tour bus the boys used alternative transport

OK that’s all for now, but tell me your word songs, I can think of a couple more but I’d like to hear from you my dear readers!

 

“Someday I’ll have a disappearing hairline, someday I’ll wear pyjamas in the daytime” June 5, 2009


Hello once again dear readers, like I’ve said before it is my aim to get back to more regular posting so here comes the second one for the Jumping month of June. I thought doing this post after a serious spillage incident on the train last week. There I was crammed into my tiny space (otherwise known as a seat) on the 7pm Kings Cross to York train with my nose in a good book (1983 by David Peace for those of you who asked!) Then lo and behold the coffee angel arrived in the aisle with the drinks trolley, now obviously I can’t resist a good coffee so obviously (a repeat word…… obviously) I had to order one, which I did, along with a Kit Kat. At the moment the Coffee Angel was about to place my drink on the pathetic excuse for a fold down table the train rocked (and not in a heavy musical way either) and faster than you can say Caffe Americano with a double shot I was the subject of a minor caffeine downpour. I thought it was rather amusing, my suit needed a dry clean anyway, but coffee angel was worried I was going to complain, but I didn’t and my reward was…….. a free Kit Kat and a fresh cup of coffee. Actually now Ive read that back it sounds dull enough to be condensed to 140 characters and posted on Twitter. But enough of that drivel during the rest of the journey I was moved to come up with a list of coffee related songs for this post. So without further adieu here they are and each one contains a frothy topping and a sprinkle of trivia.

The coffee was better in those days but clearly the coffee angels weren't!

The coffee was better in those days but clearly the coffee angels weren’t!

First cup, er sorry first up is “Starfish And Coffee” which is obviously a favourite breakfast menu of ‘The Artist Formerly Known As Prince, Then Known As Roger Or Symbol And Now Known As Prince Again’ or TAFKAPTKAROSANKAPA for short. Prince’s sister is called Tyka, I wonder if her nickname was Chicken at school? Staying with Prince and a loosely related coffee theme, the diminutive one once wrote a song for Sheena Easton called “Sugar Walls” probably not the type of sugar you’d put in your coffee though. But there’s a prize to the first person to tell me what that song is about without the use of explicit language!

Prince had clearly overdone the froth on his Cappucino

Prince had clearly overdone the froth on his Cappucino

Second dose of caffeine is “Black Coffee In Bed” by Squeeze and written by the Lennon-McCartney of their generation; Difford-Tilbrook. They were joined by the rather talented Paul Carrack who in addition to Squeeze and as a solo artist has also had hits with Ace and Mike & The Mechanics. He has also played on sessions by many other bands including Roxy Music, The Smiths and the Pretenders. In a strange coincidence he also sang vocals and played keyboards on a relatively minor Mike & The Mechanics hit called “Another Cup Of Coffee”

You won't like him when he gets angry and Mr Carrack gets very angry if he has no caffeine

You won’t like him when he gets angry and Mr Carrack gets very angry if he has no caffeine

The next one of our Barista favourites is “One More Cup Of Coffee” from the wonderful Mr Zimmerman or Bob Dylan to his friends. The song is taken from Dylan’s ‘Desire’ album and is a duet with Emmylou Harris. The song was covered extremely well by Jack and Meg on the first White Stripes album and is occasionally covered live by Calexico. Also none other than Robert ‘Percy’ Plant off of Led Zep recorded the song for his ‘Dreamland’ album in 2002. The song was written at a corner table in the ‘Other End’ nightclub in Greenwich Village New York. I was kind of hoping it had been written in a coffee bar!

Bob tries to find inspiration over a coffee..... come on Bob, Noel Gallagher sat at the same table and wrote "Roll With It"

Bob tries to find inspiration over a coffee….. come on Bob, Noel Gallagher sat at the same table and wrote “Roll With It”

The next one of our old beans in this post is the excellent Canadian band the Crash Test Dummies. Their biggest hit in the UK was “Mmm Mmm Mmm Mmm” but they also released a song called “Afternoons And Coffee Spoons” Both songs were taken from their excellent album ‘God Shuffled His Feet’ In 1995 they recorded a splendid cover of XTC’s “The Ballad Of Peter Pumpkinhead” for the Jim Carrey movie ‘Dumb And Dumber’

In the early days the band even dressed as Crash test Dummies and it certainly didn't harm their pulling power judging from this picture

In the early days the band even dressed as Crash test Dummies and it certainly didn’t harm their pulling power judging from this picture

The next act to bring us a cuppa is Holly Johnson off of Frankie Goes To Hollywood with his solo single “Americanos” It was Holly’s second solo hit and reached number 4 in the UK charts. It also features on the soundtrack to the 1989 movie ‘Cookie’ which starred Emily Lloyd, Peter Falk and Jerry Lewis. I know that strictly speaking the song is not about coffee, well not even strictly speaking, it’s actually got nothing to do with coffee. But Caffe Americano is undoubtedly my favourite coffee so I had to include it here. I always drink it black (often with an extra shot) with no sugar and many coffee houses (in this case Costa Coffee) give this an acronym of BAM (as in Black Americano). This lead to me gaining the nickname BAM BAM Bill for a while. Maybe not a great nickname but at least it wasn’t Pebbles! Over the years I have also noticed that black coffee seems to be the drink of choice for the majority of Project and Programme Managers. Does anyone agree?

"Relax" said Holly as he ordered coffees for him and his 'flat' mate Ronnie

“Relax” said Holly as he ordered coffees for him and his ‘flat’ mate Ronnie

I like a cup of coffee when I am deeply engrossed in a good book but Blur clearly prefer theirs in front of the telly! Well judging from their song “Coffee And TV” Vocals on the verses were from Graham Coxon and  Damon Albarn sang the chorus. the lyrics were all Graham’s and apparently deal with his attempt to give up alcohol. The video for the song features a milk carton called Milky which was created by ‘Jim Henson’s Creature Shop’ Blur were originally called Seymour, I’m not sure that works as well as Blur though. I have seen them live twice at festivals, once with Graham and once without. I certainly prefer them with Graham in the band. So it’s great news that they are reunited for a few gigs this year and possibly some new recording too.

Now either he's really excited or they're both seriously injured

Now either he’s really excited or they’re both seriously injured

The final coffee song in this post is one of my favourites, it’s by the minimally named ‘A’ from Leeds and it’s called “Starbucks“. The original members of the band included three brothers; Jason, Giles and Adam Perry. Since the band took a hiatus (is that code for breaking up?) Jason has worked with Matt Willis off of Busted and has also produced for McFly! Jason do us all a favour and get ‘A’ back together and stop working with these pop muppets! But to be fair Charlie off of Busted’s current band Fightstar are quite good! (Did I really just say that?)

With the proceeds of the single the band bought the worlds first Starbucks Jet Pack

With the proceeds of the single the band bought the worlds first Starbucks Jet Pack

So do you have any favourite coffee songs or indeed favourite coffees? Let me know by adding your choices in the comments

No it was just the earth moving for Milky in the Blur video

No it was just the earth moving for Milky in the Blur video

I will end this post by saying a big thank you to those wonderful people at ‘Dusk’ in York where I did many of my early posts in this blog. Excellent coffee, good food, free wifi (are you reading this Starbucks?) and great company. Check them out and if you know their web address please let me know

Dusk in York

Dusk in York