As I waited for our oldest son to get in the car I turned on the radio to the horrors of Don Henley’s “Boys of Summer.” I decided to let it play to see what Jacob would say. After 2 minutes of not acknowledging that it was playing in the background, he said without prompting, “What is this? It combines the worst of so many styles of music.”
Supporters of GIRL POWER, Scarlett Johansson is on your side! Johansson, one of the Haim sisters, and 3 other “girls” have formed The Singles. They’re a “girl group,” made entirely of “girls.” This is so cool! Check it out! Continue reading »
RHETORICAL Q: See that red head there?
STANDARD Q: Ya know who she is?
A: Marissa Ribisi
AKA…
My wife and I were driving around yesterday when Heart‘s “Barracuda” came on the radio. A few measures in she said, “This song totally represents the ’70s!” I knew what she meant. It wasn’t just the sound and the ethos of the ’70s that the song immediately took us back to: it was the fabrics, the decor, the hair, the thick cut glass at restaurants, the smells…
Is there a song that completely encompasses a specific era every time you hear it, a song that couldn’t be re-created or otherwise faked in any other era?
I can’t believe he’s going to leave us! Before Jon Stewart is gone forever, tell us what’s on your mind.
A friend of mine recently lent me a copy of some old Madness Greatest Hits. It got me thinking about the first Madness song I heard when I was a wee lass visiting my English family during the summer of 1982:
I have a soft spot for that track and even more so, for their earlier, more ska-inflected sound. (My sister had a great ska compilation that mixed “Night Boat to Cairo” into The Specials’ “Friday Night, Saturday Morning,” a one-two punch I always think of when I hear either of those songs. But I digress.)
Fast forward ten years or so to the next great Wave of English Working Class Rock, and you get songs like this:
In the early Aughts you can hear a semi-distant refrain, these guys taking the piss:
Help me connect the dots. Choose a band a decade earlier than Madness, one that celebrated the rich life of the English prols. Or can you think of their distant echo in, say, 2012 or beyond?
I hope the subject line of this thread is self-explanatory. If not, try this pump-priming entry…after the jump!
