We write about the songs that make the whole world sing, we write about the songs of love and special things, we write about the songs that make the young girls cry, we write about the songs, we write about the songs.
A few months ago I was trying to work out the name of this song in my head that went "Emaline I think you're swell and you really give me hell". Couldn't find a sausage. I'd got the lyrics all mixed up into a twisted version of a Ben Folds Five number. Then while looking for number ones of 1969, like you do, I came across this toppermost of the poppermost hit from January that year.
A typical Leeds lad, in 1978 Barry Ryan married Her Highness Tunku (Princess) Miriam binti al-Marhum Sultan Sir Ibrahim, the daughter of the Sultan of Johor. It didn't last.
I could write a whole blog on Ben Folds and his Five. The song you posted below is from last September's album, Way To Normal. I downloaded it, listened to it once and never returned to it until you posted You Don't Know Me. It's a grower, it has its moments, but the thing is this:
When you've written a song like Philosophy, where do you go from there? Well, Steven's Last Night in Town and Narcolepsy, clearly, and even Ben's first two proper albums had half a dozen songs each of the standard we'd come to love. And it's saddening how one of my two hereos (Jerry Seinfeld being the other) has lowered his game to this radio-friendly- if it wasn't Ben Folds I wouldn't give it the time of day- mush, but I think we can accord him the same status as Queen and Billy Joel who smashed our musical illusions by making a load of great albums and then a load of guff. That's age for you.
I was going to post more videos then, but I've just discovered there was a Ben Folds Five reunion gig in Chapel Hill on 18 September last year. Josephine Funseeker's birthday! I'm going to watch that instead. Why don't you watch it too? This is huge.
Well it's now 4.15am and I just watched that and it brought forward all kinds of emotions, from the trumpet at 2:22 in Don't Change Your Plans and onwards and before that. What a band. Sometimes you get two friends together and they become a couple and they thank you, but it doesn't compare to my thanks to you and Áine for getting me into this band. Thank you and good night, good night, sweet baby. The world has more for you.
Dear Daniel,
Well crikey, you're welcome. I wasn't aware that Reinhold Messner had become something of a lost classic in the US or that Robert Sledge had become overweight or that Darren Jessie had a solo career. To be honest, I didn't realise ten years had passed. Bloody hell.
In record-straightening news: I was a fan of Billy Joel aged 7, with a nostalgic relapse aged 11 - 13. It don't makes him my Queen, he's my ironic nostaligic childhood joke-act reference, or "inchjar". No musical illusions were smashed by that man, he doesn't deserve that much attention. I think REM were to me what Queen were to you. But anyway, I see your point...
Dear James,
Darren Jessee now sings in Hotel Lights. At first listen, I'm tempted to say it sounds like non-descript, lily-livered Americana. You might like it, you like Elliott Smith.
Jonathan Ross has just played this song on his Radio 2 show. I'd never heard it before, although I imagine it's a probably not hot off the presses. I've really drifted away from his stuff ever since it became clear he was a really good songwriter. Does that sound odd? What I mean is: when it became obvious he could pen a good tune. That if you asked him to write something for you, he'd be able to do it in a minute and it would be... good.
Hmmm. Try this: Ben Folds Five felt like a really fine cottage industry, putting a bit of blood sweat and tears into their goods and it was sometimes shoddy but you knew somebody had put a heap of love into it. Nowadays, he's bought a big factory and the product's similar, but I can see the machine-cut edges. It's a taste thing. I buy free range eggs.
There's a second reason I was moved to write about Ben Folds. He turned up on Sky news this week. In amongst the reporters kicking in doors and over-egging their pieces to camera, there was this report on a contest to find the best a capella rendition of one of his songs.
I like this one.
mainly for the lead vocalist's arm-brace (unfortunate 11th-hour free-running mishap? Or attempt to create himself a thing, i.e. "It's that guy! You know - with the arm-brace!"). Also for the fact that the camera-operators clearly had no idea he was going to give it quite so much and for the truly really-well-done instrumental section.
And for the guy at the end who thought they were going to shout cut a lot earlier...
Woody Allen's new film is called Vicky Christina Barcelona. From that trailer alone, I wouldn't bother. But it features the combined talents of That One from Lost in Translation, That One from Vanilla Sky and That One from No Country for Old Men, plus That One Who Used to Write Hilarious Social Satires of New York New-Wavers. My brother dismisses it as Woody Allen trying again to write around a particular city, like he did in Match Point. I don't know what he's talking about: I don't remember Match Point. He says that's probably for the best.
Did we watch "Jamon Jamon" together during an ill-conceived film marathon at Sheffield Uni? I definitely remember "Golden Balls" which was supposed to be the sequel, right? I think you told me that. Well, Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem were together in that, being all porno. Did you see No Country for Old Men? Not at all porno...
I can't tell you why Vicky Christina Ronaldo reminds me of Little Boots in this public arena (and I use the word "public" quite wrongly) but it's a decent enough way to introduce you to the UK sound of 2009 (copyright everyone), a talented young lady from Blackpool via Leeds who also happens to be another of my friends from the Leeds music scene who has leapt onto the rung of the music ladder where people leaning idly from upstairs windows can see you for the first time and start asking your name and listening carefully to the answer. "Hello, interesting new person," they say, "would you like some tea?"
Dear James,
Great stuff. You haven't made tea for Little Boots, have you? It'll put her right off the music biz before she's even got started. That is very good stuff, a bit like Ben Folds when he plays Smoke, only not like that very much. And also a bit like Victoria Wood, and I mean that in the nicest possible way. What's that little box she's playing with? Have you got one?
Match Point is the one where the posh chap who's supposed to be Irish kills the one from Lost In Translation and gets away with it, via a clumsy tennis metaphor. Apparently there's a ghost in the final scene; I've yet to see it. Sadly, it introduced a whole new generation over here to Woody Allen, as I sat groping my Hannah and Her Sisters DVD.
We did see Golden Balls together at the union cinema, I enjoyed Jamon Jamon later that summer with the curtains closed. I'm concerned that you think you were with me at the time. I'm now thinking of you in the erotic garlic scene. "¿Te gusta el ajo?" "Mmm, ¡venga!" That kind of thing would have lost No Country For Old Men the Oscar.
James and Daniel, or Jim and Danny to an unfortunate few, were going to be like the old men who ran 78 Records in Stockport, but writing a blog about the songs and videos they came across seemed a lot less hassle, and saved them having to move to Stockport. And so they created 78x78 Records, so that other people could know what it was like to be their friend, and what they wrote about when they wrote to each other about music. And so they will post videos of songs you might enjoy 78x78 times. And then they will stop. And then they will do something else. That's 6084 posts. They´ll endeavour to get it done quickly. They'd love to hear from you and any videos or songs you'd like them to post. You can do this by commenting in the pertinent area, or by e-mailing them your suggestions at 78discos@gmail.com
