Here we are again, with another futile, and out-of-date, exercise:
Yellow Magic Orchestra, “Technopolis”: in an ideal world, this would have been the theme music for a long-running current affairs television show. It deserves to be as ubiquitous as it sounds like it is.
DAF, “Der Mussolini”: one of the last of my itches to have remained unscratched. Thundering early-1980s German electronic dance music that makes fascism seem like a damn fine idea. Oops.
Lindstrom, “I Feel Space”: more electronic dance music, this one from 2005, which will answer most of your questions about why you should listen to music of this century even if you have passed 40 years of age.
Television Personalities, “I Know Where Syd Barrett Lives”: comes down to one word - “aaaaaahhhh”.
Kevin Ayers featuring Syd Barrett, “Religious Experience (Singing A Song In The Morning)”: there is some magical VU-style guitar riffage in here, which I assume to be Barrett’s contribution, although I’m no expert here.
Kevin Ayers, “Lady Rachel”: this is Ayers in a much darker, gothic, minor-chord mode.
Bird Nest Roys, “Jaffa Boy”: here we have what is, along with “Pink Frost” by the Chills, the lasting achievement of the golden age of NZ pop. Which is not to discredit others whose contributions may have been more lasting, more prolific, or more solid and/or brilliant overall than the shortlived Roys. But one cannot deny that this is a perfect, moving Pop Moment.
Robert Scott with Barbara Manning, “B4 We Go Under”: and here we have a little lo-fi obscurity from one of those prolific others, Robert Scott from the Bats, singing with Ms Manning who, if memory serves, ran off with one of the Jefferies boys, who covered her “Scissors” on one of his own records. Where this recording fits in with that chronology I do not know, but it does provide another small piece in what is a rather complicated puzzle.
The Roches, “Hammond Song”: our hopes of this being the Roche girls doing their thing in company with the mighty Hammond B3 were sorely, but only temporarily, dashed. There is not an organ in sight here (ahem), and the Hammond they are singing about is a place. But the song itself turns out to be slow and lovely, and makes up for the 95 percent of songs that get held out by (some) bloggers as being worthy of your time but which turn out not to be.
Donovan, “Colours”: interesting to note that hot on the heels of Dylan’s “Chronicles: Volume One” comes an autobiography by Donovan. It looks like Donovan is always going to be Stuart MacGill to Dylan’s Shane Warne.
Fred Neil with Gram Parsons, “You Don’t Miss Your Water”: you could collect versions of this song, like you could (if you were me) collect versions of “A Man And A Woman”, or “Love Is Blue”. Artists as disparate as the Triffids and Brian Eno have had a go. But Fred and Gram would be a tough act to beat.
Opal, “Hear The Wind Blow” and “She’s A Diamond”: two from Opal’s “Early Recordings”, a disc which continues to elude me and which I am therefore reduced to picking up in dribs and drabs by way of this thing we call the interweb.
Tom Ze, “Brigitte Bardot”: with summer in full flight, it would be remiss of us not to include at least a little piece of Brazil.
Rachel Stevens, “I Said Never Again (But Here We Are)”: one of the singles of 2005. A perfect pop song never did anyone any harm. (Except when it gets wedged in your head and keeps you from going to sleep.)
The Comateens, “Nightmares”: pure pop from another era.
The Smoking Popes, “I Need You Around”: the ghost of Morrissey hovers above and slightly behind this song, giving it the dose of passion without which it might not have registered.
Manfred Mann’s Earth Band, “Solar Fire”: ah, the psychedelic psixties.
Morgen, “Of Dreams”: there were two songs by this band floating around in the ether at the same time. I snaffled this one, but the other one got away. If the words “prog rock” turn you into stone, try this. You can feel the difference.
Spanky & Our Gang, “Leopard Skin Phones”: ah, the early days of stereo.
