With Just A Hint Of Mayhem

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

“And everywhere I look there’s a devil waiting” March 27, 2014


5124382-3x2-940x627Now the North Korean authorities have decreed that everyone must get a hair cut exactly like their supreme leader Kim Jong-Un, (Actually just male undergradutes to begin with). Really? I know it might sound a little rich coming from a bald bloke like me, but Mr Jong-Un has a shit haircut doesn’t he? Will North Korean women also have to have the same haircut too?

Imagine if every country had that rule I would have worn a wig for years, including a Thatcher syrup (that’s cockney rhyming slang for the benefit of my overseas readers). Nowadays I’d have to seek out a nondescript Cameron cut.

Anyway let’s celebrate this ridiculous news with a haircut themed post. While you are listening click here to read the story on the BBC site.

KIM-JONG-UN-IDIOT-WITH-A-BAD-HAIRCUT-105504738689

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“I’ll be your clown or your puppet or your April Fool, cut my hair I’ll even wear a mask” December 7, 2010


December 7th and just 18 days to go now until the big bearded bloke in red arrives on your roof. It’s strange isn’t it that we spend much of our lives telling our children not to speak to strangers but come Christmas we effectively tell them a fat, old, loudly dressed bloke is going to break into their house and leave them presents. It seems a bit strange when you look at it that way doesn’t it? Anyway enough of that nonsense, let’s open the door for december 7th on my UK Christmas Number Ones Advent Calender. Forgive me but this one really is a steaming pile of number twos, but I bet if you listen to it just once you won’t get it out of your head for ages.

Little Jimmy

It still holds the record for the youngest artist ever to have a UK number one, he was just 9 years and 8 months. Laydeez and Gennermen I give you….. LITTLE…… JIMMY……..OSMOND!!! Yes it is time to dust off that bloody awful song (well in my opinion anyway) “Long Haired Lover From Liverpool”. The song was number one at Christmas 1972 and stayed there for 5 weeks and sold just short of 1 million copies. I hope all 998,000 of you still feel guilty! Sadly it went to number one on December 23rd 1972 thus preventing Chuck Berry‘s “My Ding-A-Ling” from staying on top for Christmas!

Big Jimmy

Little Jimmy rode the successful wave of his siblings success, along with the Jackson 5 the Osmonds were one of the biggest pop bands on the planet in the early part of the 70s. In fact the Osmonds first big hit in the UK was “One Bad Apple” which is a very good song, but in my opinion is very much identikit Jackson 5. What do you think?

See You Jimmy

James Arthur Osmond, (for that is Little Jimmy’s real name) went on to become quite a good friend of Michael Jackson. He went on to work for the King Of Pop during the ‘Bad’ Tour in the 80s. The Japanese leg of the tour was sponsored by Pepsi and the Japanese TV Company Nippon TV. It was Jimmy that negotiated the sponsorship deal with Nippon TV.

Here is Master Osmond with that bloody song!

And if you thought that was annoying how about his cover of the Connie Francis song “Tweedle Dee”?

 

“We don’t care about no government warning” February 28, 2009


hello everybody, well I have some interesting news on our recent ‘Lily Allen Naked’ experiment. As you may recall we were trying to see whether anyone would arrive at the blog using ‘Lily Allen Naked’ as a search term. It seems that there are millions of sites allegedly offering pictures of Lily in the buff. So the experiment didn’t work, but strangely enough, there was a search term used Thursday which led someone to my blog. Don’t worry guys it doesn’t tell me who it was but I’ll guess it was Tom or Jes. The search term was ‘Chris Allen naked’ Does anyone know who Chris Allen is? I certainly don’t, there are plenty of Chris Allens that show up when you Google the name but I don’t know which one someone wanted to see naked. So any insights from you dear readers will be much appreciated.

Anyway if you have arrived at this blog with a desperate desire to view the talented Miss Allen naked, just so you’re not too disappointed here is Lily…….errr…… in the pink!

we'll drink a drink a drink to Lily in pink in pink in pink!

we'll drink a drink a drink to Lily in pink in pink in pink!

And as a special bonus here is Lily with “The Fear“. Check out her new album too, it is rather good!

Another piece of hot news (well perhaps just lukewarm by the time that you read it) Damon Albarn has confirmed that Blur will be headlining one night at Glastonbury this year. I’ve seen them live twice and they were great both times although so much better with Graham Coxon. It’s great to see Mr C back in the fold.

Graham really hoped the photoshoot would be over soon, he was busting for a pee.

Graham really hoped the photoshoot would be over soon, he was busting for a pee.

Anyway lets’ get back to todays trivia megamix starting with the birthdays. First of those is Cindy Wilson from the B-52’s who was born on 28th February 1957 and is 52 today. Cindy was born in Athens, Georgia in the US, this fact fans is also where REM came from. Cindy’s older brother Ricky is also in the band. I guess most people assume that the band named themselves after the B-52 bomber (like U2 naming themselves after the U2 spy plane). However this is not the case, B-52 was also the nickname in the southern states for the ‘Beehive‘ hairdo and Cindy and Kate Pierson of the band sported that style of hair. But I suppose as the hairstyle is named after the nose of the plane they were indirectly named after the plane after all! Incidentally the bands hairstylist La-Verne was even among the credits on their first eponymously titled first album in 1979. Cindy left the band in 1992 (although she rejoined in 1998) and for their US tour that year was replaced by Julee Cruise (whose biggest hit was the theme to the stupendous ‘Twin Peaks’ TV series from David Lynch). Although somewhat strangely for a one off fundraiser for the Democrat presidential candidate Jerry Brown Cindy’s place was taken by Kim Basinger. As a reminder of just how good they were (indeed still are) here are the B-52’s with “Rock Lobster

Cindy and Kate thought they'd been stung by their hairdresser, $50 and nowhere near as high as Marge Simpsons hair

Cindy and Kate thought they'd been stung by their hairdresser, $50 and nowhere near as high as Marge Simpsons hair

The last of the birthdays is that of King Monkey Ian Brown, former front man of the Stone Roses and now a very talented solo star. Ian is 46 today. He is just a few months younger than Roses guitarist John Squire and they were brought up just a couple of doors apart and went to Altrincham Grammar School together. They had been called ‘English Rose’ after a track on the Jam’s ‘Setting Sons’ album. They were booked for some Swedish gigs after Brown befriended a Swedish promoter while hitching around Europe and wanted a new name. Apparently they considered the name ‘Angry Young Teddy Bears’ before settling on the ‘Stone Roses’ a combination of their previous name and part of the name of one of their favourite bands the Rolling Stones. Somehow I don’t think their acclaimed status would have been the same had they adopted the ‘Angry Young Teddy Bears’ moniker. What do you think? While you’re pondering that one here are the boys with “I Wanna Be Adored

The Angry Young Teddy Bears all received Painting By Numbers sets that Christmas. What a load of Pollocks!

The Angry Young Teddy Bears all received Painting By Numbers sets that Christmas. What a load of Pollocks!

On this day in 1968 Frankie Lymon was found dead at his mothers house of a suspected drugs overdose. He was just 25. As the lead singer with ‘Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers’ he became the youngest UK chart topper in 1957 aged just 13, when they reached the summit “Why Do Fools Fall In Love” He then became the youngest headliner at the London Palladium in 1958 aged just 14 while promoting their UK hit (which I believe failed to chart in the US) “I’m Not A Juvenile Delinquent“. Frankie retained the youngest UK chart topper record until 1972 when ‘Little’ Jimmy Osmond went to number one with the dreadful “Long Haired Lover From Liverpool” aged 9.

Frankie and the boys were looking forward to their appearance on Sesame Street to teach everyone about the letter 'T'

Frankie and the boys were looking forward to their appearance on Sesame Street to teach everyone about the letter 'T'

On this day in 1970 Led Zeppelin played a gig as the Nobs in Copenhagen after Eva Von Zeppelin, a relative of the Airship designer Ferdinand Von Zeppelin threatened to sue if the family name was used in Denmark. Later that same year Led Zep were voted Best Group in the New Musical Express (NME) readers poll, which broke a run of eight successive wins for the Beatles.

the hotel hairdryer was never strong enough for those Led boys

the hotel hairdryer was never strong enough for those Led boys

This day in 1998 saw ‘Cornershop’ sitting at the top of the UK singles chart with the excellent ‘Fatboy Slim’ remix of their superb song “Brimful Of Asha“. the Fatboy loved the song so much that he did the remix for free. The Asha in the song’s title is Asha Bhosle a Bollywood Playback singer. Indian films have relied heavily on song-and-dance numbers attributable to Broadway musicals. Almost always, the singing was performed by background singers while the actors and actresses mimed. Bhosle has sung more than 12.000 of these songs. Two other Playback singers, Lata Mangeshkar (Asha Bhosle’s sister) and Mohammed Rafi are also name-checked in the lyrics.

Once again Tjinder had fallen asleep at the mic

Once again Tjinder had fallen asleep at the mic

The next two aren’t strictly ‘onthisdays’ for February 28th, but it’s not a leap year so here are a couple from 29th February. Firstly on 29th February 1980 the glasses that Buddy Holly had been wearing when he died were discovered in a police file in Iowa where they had been for 21 years. The Beatles name is in part an homage to Buddy Holly and the Crickets and in one of lifes full circles Paul McCartney now owns the publishing rights to Buddy’s song catalogue.

The Invisible Man felt stupid for getting himself stuck in the Hall of Mirrors at the Fun Fair

The Invisible Man felt stupid for getting himself stuck in the Hall of Mirrors at the Fun Fair

Also on 29th February 2000 Eric Clapton received a 6 month driving ban in the UK for driving at 45mph in a 30 mph zone. So not such much of a slowhand after all are you Mr C? What’s your favourite Clapton song? This is mine, it’s “Layla” from his days as Derek and the Dominoes, although I really don’t like the unplugged version of it. Contrary to popular belief the signature guitar riff on that song came from Duane Allman and not Mr Clapton.

Eric was pleased that he had a friend like JJ to help him get to his gigs while he was banned from driving

Eric was pleased that he had a friend like JJ to help him get to his gigs while he was banned from driving

So dear reader if you have read this far, you have reached the end of todays post and I salute you! 🙂