Left and to the Back
Digging for nuggets from the dusty old storerooms of pop.
20 January 2021
Reupload - The Vibrants - Something About You Baby/ Danger Zone
17 January 2021
Fresh Meat - Never Mind The Money/ Candy Eyes
13 January 2021
Maggie - L David Sloane/ Too Young To Get Married
10 January 2021
Linda Jardim - 60 Miles By Road Or Rail/ Energy In Northampton
Label: Northampton Development Corporation
Year of Release: 1980(?)
The late seventies and early eighties were a peculiar period for local councils and authorities, who all seemed to be competing with each other to find innovative ways of attracting both new residents and external investment. Having a flashy theme tune seemed to be one of the weapons in their arsenal - catchy numbers like "South Woodham Ferrers" and the Gerard Kenny-esque "You've Never Seen Anything Like It - Central Milton Keynes" are frequently held up for mockery now, but probably seemed like a good idea at the time.
This, though, is one of the most utterly absurd. Clearly one of the promotional team at the Northampton Development Corporation had been listening to one Gary Numan album too many, and decided that the best way of making the city sound like the settlement of the future would be to adopt a strange synth-pop tune about aliens landing there.
This idea was clearly cautiously green lit but not given the most attention, as the A-side here - the snappily titled "60 Miles By Road Or Rail" - has the same tune, but is lyrically more straightforward, conservative and everyday, chronicling the love affair of a London woman with a Northampton man and her exciting journeys up and down the M1 to sleep with him. Oddly, the song doesn't seem to focus much on Northampton's beauty spots or unique features, and instead the city means one thing only to this lady; it's the centre of Love. We're not given any hints about how the affair ended, which means we never do get to find out whether she got fed up with shlepping up and down the motorway and asked him to move to London with her. Nonetheless, it's actually a very appealing tune with lots of genuine eighties pop suss behind it, succeeding in making me feel nostalgic for the days when modern developments and new towns weren't supposed to give you the blues.
The flip is where the oddball alien bananas pop can be found, and by God does everyone push the boat out here. From the humming synths in the intro to the alien voiceover, to the lyrics about neutron wars on other planets and the location of fresh energy resources in Northampton (which I would have thought the Northampton Development Corporation would have been against being stolen by intergalactic forces - it's a bad thing in Sim City, after all) it's the noise of every conceivable futuristic button being pushed to overload. I have no doubt everyone involved approached this with their tongues firmly in cheeks, but despite this it's extraordinarily thoughtfully arranged and performed, from those Meat Loaf styled tumbling piano lines to the dispassionate alien voices throughout.
6 January 2021
Reupload - The Sad - It Ain't Easy/ Box
Year of Release: 1971
You've probably already guessed from the very fact that I wrote about Starbuck's "Do You Like Boys" not long ago, but overtly gay glam rock fascinates me. To put it into historical perspective, until 1967 homosexual activity was illegal in the UK. Glam rock may have arrived in the middle of a new, forward thinking decade, but it was still a mere few years away from some rather heavy-handed bigotry. There were still plenty of intolerant, prudish, vinegary "silent majority" types on the prowl who might have in some instances accepted the ban on homosexual activity being lifted, but almost certainly still didn't want to hear from the people who "did that sort of thing".
Which makes singles like "Do You Like Boys" and this one, "It Ain't Easy", truly astonishing. David Bowie putting his arms around Mick Ronson on "Top of the Pops" could have been interpreted in a number of ways and shrugged off as an innocent matey gesture. This single, on the other hand, is upfront and blatant, and frankly couldn't give a fig.
Telling the tale of a married rock star who is incapable of remaining faithful to his wife, and happily sleeps with both men and women depending on which mood he's in, it's very daring for 1971. Of course, it's impossible not to feel a little sorry for his wife, though one can only assume that she was forewarned. If not, the issue of this single may have acted as a highly inappropriate public announcement. "It ain't easy for my wife to live with me!" declares the stadium chant chorus, while the singer backs this up with "There's always some young girl or even boy in sight/ and I don't care it's what I take home at night".
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