On 13th November 2020 Kylie Minogue went to No.1 on the UK album chart with ‘Disco’, making her the only woman to top the chart in five consecutive decades. Who doesn’t love Kylie? She is fab!
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Iconic Manchester band the Inca Babies will soon be releasing an album that reimagines via rerecording some of their finest songs. It is called ‘Reincarnation’ and is out on 28th November. In advance they have released a two track single, “Two Rails To Nowhere” with the second track being the 1988 original featuring Inspiral Carpets stalwart Clint Boon. I love the new version, the instrumentation evokes the more chilled output from the KLF and Angelo Badalamenti’s work on the ‘Twin Peaks’ soundtrack. Vocally it sounds more like a countrified blues track about going to jail. Country but not set in the US deep south, but in Manchester. I think Nick Cave could make a great cover of this song. If Shane McGowan was still alive he could have done a great shared vocal on the track. Based on this and the previously released reincarnated version of “Candy Mountain” I reckon the album will be classy indeed.
Inca Babies front man Harry Stafford had this to say about “Two Rails To Nowhere”; “This was from our fourth album ‘Evil Hour’. On the original version, we managed to hire Clint Boon of the Inspiral Carpets to play Hammond organ for us. This is a song that was inspired by the trad country blues number ‘Midnight Special’, but somehow had more of a Gun Club vibe to it“. This single will be on rotation at Mayhem Towers for a while!
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Here comes the 35th track in the Play It Again Mayhem series. This time it is the turn of Australian rock band Icehouse. They had their first Australian hit single in 1980 and continued to enter the Aussie top 50 up until 1990. They never really had a succession of worldwide hits until 1982’s “Hey Little Girl” which is now included in the Play It Again Mayhem playlist. The song charted in Australia, obviously, New Zealand, Austria, Switzerland, Germany, USA and the UK. Sadly it only reached number 17 in the UK charts. It is a perky synthpop classic with some quite dark lyrics. The band still play isolated festivals and events. I was lucky enough to see them when they supported David Bowie, as did the Beat, at the Milton Keynes Bowl in 1983.
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To my knowledge, apart from perhaps Mura Masa the Channel Isles haven’t produced that many pop or rock stars. But Rich Allo who grew up in Jersey might be the one to change that. His new single “You” is a phenomenal track. It has a soft heartbeat pace and some cinematic ambition. All of this is overlaid and wonderfully finished with Rich’s ethereal, soulful, impassioned vocal. The song reminded me of George Michael and Bruce Hornsby.
Rich says that some of his key influences are Freddie Mercury, Keane, Elton John, Bruce Springsteen and U2. If he gets the airplay that I believe he deserves then maybe he and his music could stand alongside some of these artists one day. “You” has a cut glass clearness in its production which gives the song a glorious soundtrack sheen. The track encompasses fragility, strength, positivity and melancholy in equal measures. It is a song that inspires and makes you consider life and where you might fit in to the overall scheme of things. I love it!
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It has been quite a while since our last weird facts post, so here comes number 9. CAT scans only exist because of The Beatles. The initial funding for the research into the tech came because record label EMI was so flush with Beatles money. CAT scan is a medical imaging technique that uses X-rays and a computer to create detailed, cross-sectional images of the inside of the body. In the early 1960s Allan Cormack developed the mathematical theory for CT scanning and performed the first experimental demonstration. Then in 1967 Godfrey Hounsfield began working on the CT project at EMI Central Research Laboratories in London. Both of them later won a Nobel Prize for their groundbreaking work.
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On 10th November 1955 Elvis Presley attended the fourth Country Music Disc Jockey Convention in Nashville Tennessee. When he returned to his hotel after the Convention Mae Boren Axton played him a demo of a new song she had written with Tommy Durden called “Heartbreak Hotel”. Presley released the track as a single on January 27, 1956. It was his first release on his new record label RCA Victor. The song gave him his his first No.1 one pop record in the USA. It also reached number 3 in Australia and number 2 in the UK. As was common for the times Presley was given a co writing credit simply for agreeing to record the song.
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debdepan are Margate based female duo Chelsea Tolhurst and Grace Bontoft. They formed in March 2022 after writing together during the Covid lockdowns. They have have released a hauntingly, captivating emotional single called “Ghost”. It charts some deep, dark gothic waters with a pinch of baroque style. There is an air of depressive fragility in the verses and then a magnificent chorus that explodes through the darkness like a huge solar flare. The song is taken from their upcoming EP, ‘Lovers & Others’, which will be out on Silent Kid Records on 28th November. debdepan said this of the track “This song had to feel like a journey – slightly hopeful initially and slowly turning a little bit dark with insecurity coming in and then the chorus feeling like a total release of emotions. It needed a big fat pop chorus to juxtapose the dark and miserable verses. This song was recorded with Mike Collins and Mike had a wicked idea to layer a bunch of guitars in the middle 8 to really build some tension“. The video has Chelsea and Grace dressed as classic sheet covered ghosts and is a lot of fun! I just know that the new EP will be an instant classic when it arrives!
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If you love a gorgeously mellow blues style overlaid with a soulful emotional vocal then you will love “Sailboat In The Sky” the new single from Nathan Bryce and Loaded Dice. This is the product of a writing collaboration between Bryce and Candace Crockett. The song has a loping beat and provides an endless supply of endorphins. It is one of the best feel good songs I have heard for years. Some of the blues stylings made me think of Elvin Bishop. I know that I will be singing the chorus in my head, and maybe even out loud for weeks. Feeling down? Need a musical pick me up? Then listen to “Sailboat In The Sky” NOW!
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On November 8th 1958 the soundtrack to South Pacific went to No.1 on the UK album chart. It became the longest running No.1 album of all time spending a total of 115 weeks at the No.1 position. It went to the top of the UK charts in 1958, 1959, 1960 and 1961. The Nellie in the title of this post was Nellie Forbush who sang the song, “I’m Gonna Wash That Man Right Outa My Hair” in the film. All the songs were written by Rodgers and Hammerstein for the Broadway version of the show from which the film was derived.
One of the most popular songs on the soundtrack, certainly my favourite is “Happy Talk”. It has been covered by many artists, including Doris Day, Ella Fitzgerald and Captain Sensible. Juanita Hall sang the song on the film soundtrack and appeared in the movie as Bloody Mary. The soundtrack album was number one in the UK album charts on the day I was born, 1st January 1959. Yes I really am that old even though I look so young! 😉
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Your soundtrack for Armageddon just got loads better. The Apocalypse Disco return with their first release since their magnificent ‘Welcome To The Disco’ EP back in January. The new single is called “Bring On The Storm” and it is a booming bass driven techno dance floor anthem. No one would be surprised if the late, great Keith Flint would be resurrected if he heard this magnificent masterpiece and joined Ian and Robin with alacrity in this hard electro rave stomper. The song shouts back at the destruction and devastation that the metaphorical storm that is the world today with waves of positivity. “We can dance, even in the eye of the storm“, indeed we can, and we fucking should! This song will have the four horsemen of the apocalypse quaking in their plague boots and it will curdle their plans of pestilence! A huge welcome back to the Apocalypse Disco, we missed you and the world needs you! They will be playing at the Fulford Arms in York on 5th December. I will see you there!
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