| Wednesday, January 05, 2005 |
 | Inspired by a New Year's Eve conversation I decided, in a fit of sheer self-indulgence, to play myself an old mix tape (or CD, more precisely) and try to remember why I had put those songs together. Scrutiny of subsequent mix CDs demonstrated that, since most of them had been created in the period between getting a CD-burner (early 1999 - serial connection - very exciting) and getting a CD-MP3 Walkman (December 2001, in an electronics store in Boston, having a bit of spare time at the end of a business trip), and are more about the horizontal redistribution of the tracks on the albums I was listening to at the time. Coincidentally, this time coincides with I think probably my lowest ebbs and silliest highs.
A man could himself in London. Lose himself. LOSE HIMSELF!
Our featured CD, then, is titled "Prom Queens, Bad Dreams", from, at a guess, early 2001. It was made for a dual purpose, IIRC. First, to provide a peppy, upbeat opening 15 minutes or so to cover the tube and walk from Shoreditch station to Hoxton Square in the morning. Then, to provide the diminuendo of the prom night feel - a descent into paranoia and distrust, melancholy and intermittent joy. It's probably fair to say that I had some issues. I'm not even sure if I made it to my "senior prom" - having gone in the lower 6th with a real live older girl, I think I might have given it a swerve - but we're talking about the iconography here - corsages, limos, mickeys, hotel rooms.
Onwards:
Praise You – Fatboy Slim - I realise this looks bad, but hear me out. The whole point about this early part of the CD was that it was a high school prom. "Praise You" was pretty much the ultimate late-90s senior prom song. Observe "She's All That" and "Buffy the Vampire Slayer", in both of which seminal teen experiences there is at some point a dance routine to "Praise You". Sometimes you have to sacrifice the limb for the whole.
Sound file - Woo-hoo! - from the much-missed Breakup Girl.
Clubbed to Death – Rob D - again, we're looking at dancable, jaunty, on the way to work stuff. Alternatively, I am a closet goth, which would explain a lot.
Badtimes – Laika - It's a single joke - the contents of the "Badtimes" mass email, itself a parody of the hoax virus warning about the "good times" virus read out to a trip-hop beat, but at this point you're at the top of Brick Lane, with a bagel in your hand (herring, salt beef if you had a late night) and the rhythm keeps you moving.
P.A.C.O – Ladytron - into Hoxton Square, and climbing the stairs. This excitable electronic reworking of the theme tune to "Are You Being Served" was a necessary pick-me-up.
Sound file - “You're hurting me – that's good too” - Darla, from Buffy. Buffy crps up a fair amount here - it had hit terrestrial in 98 and I was enthralled. Six years on, it's hard to recall the thrill of watching episodes of Buffy for the first time, but it was, in many ways, precisely what I'd wanted to be around when I was a teenager and had had to settle for Dark Season - mighty, but differently mighty.
Strong – Velvet Chain - See the power of Buffy? It can even insinuate substandard US corporate indie onto what is really starting to look like a very ropey mix CD. This was played at the Bronze in "Never Kiss a Boy on the First Date". It is with the best will in the world not a great song.
French Rock'n'Roll – Black Box Recorder - thank God. A bit of credibility. Notwithstanding the joys of ye-ye, there were elements of this that really hit the spot - somebody, at the risk of undue Smallvillism, was saving me. Not least the fuzzy instrumentation around Nixey's vocals.
Ouvrez la fenetre, regardez le chansonnier,
Ecoutez la musique. C'est parfait.
Tidal Wave – The Magnetic Fields - I'm honestly unsure whether I have made it through a month without blogging, quoting or burning this song. One of the songs I can't imagine doing without, and based on a kind of obsessional focus in the face of the world that was very much a necessary part of life. Much like meditation, in fact, but quicker.
The boys talk like they own the world,
The women keep their stupid diaries,
When suddenly there's a tidal wave,
And everything is swept out to sea
When they played it live the last time I saw them (promoting the release in the UK of their back catalogue, which of course everybody there already owned), I welled up, and I am ashamed to admit it only if it suggests the wrong kind of kittenish effeminacy.
I Know That Loving – Tindersticks - and we're back. After "Travelling Light", this is possibly the most depressing song in a spectacularly depressing catalogue. For those who have not heard Tindersticks, it's a bit like taking a bath with Samuel Beckett. A bath of glue. This was a reference to a gig I saw, and a long journey home.
Let the Sun Shine In – Frente - If you know Frente at all, it's probably as the creators of "Horrible", briefly played on Mark Radcliffe's show in the late 90s. This track is taken from an album of tributes to saturday morning cartoons, and is, believe it or not, a cover of a song sung by Pebbles and Bam Bam. When lines like:
When I forget to say my prayers the Devil jumps with glee,
But he feels so awful awful when he sees me on my knees
Are voiced breathily by an indie clonette, it starts feeling oddly wrong.
You, You, You, You, You – The 6ths
You make me feel like I'm seventeen again,
You make everything beautiful seem true.
I can't wait to go to sleep and dream again,
'Cause every dream I dream's a dream of dreamy little you...
A rare uncomplicated love song from the Merritt hit factory, this is a relentless ray of cloud-breaking sunshine - the high point of an upswing from Tindersticks.
Sound file - “Don't sleep with someone in order to get over someone – especially if its that person” - words to live by.
A Little Guilt – Laptop - And the payoff. Whenever I have seen Laptop live, he has performed an acoustic set. I find this terribly endearing.
I feel so sick, I can't sleep,
I got my head in the toilet, got a case of dry heaves.
I'd give anything to get rid of this mood poisoning
Give me Back my Dreams – the 6ths - This is cheating, of course - two songs by the same artist on one CD. The only defence is that they have different vocalists, in this case Sally Timms of the Mekons.
Sound file - “Did you try looking behind the sofa in Hell?" - Geekery
My Body May Die – Pulp vs. The Swingle Sisters - The song that heralds the first arrival onto the screen of the ghost of Marty Hopkirk in the Reeves and Mortimer remake, but try not to hold that against it. This fulfils the statutory requirement that Jarvis Cocker play some part in every mix CD ever made.
Sound file - terrified grunting
Cannonball – The Breeders - a tribute to my butch-dyke LTG, who has been missing in action for some years now. She had a thing for the Deals, back when it was OK to have a thing for the Deals, and there are very few mixes not improved by the presence of Cannonball - I remember bouncing around Popstars to it way back when.
Bohemian Like You – The Dandy Warhols - Pre-mobile phone ads, I feel I ought to point out. This could be seen as a jeremiad against my failure to achieve the state of carefree, cashless bohoism that many of my friends seem to handle so well, but to be honest it's more likely that i had run out of songs I wanted and still had ten minutes to fill. See also:
New Angels of Promise – David Bowie - not Bowie's finest hour, despite the excellent title, and not his finest album, either, unless you are ready to squint and see the fact that his voice is utterly fucked as poignant rather than a reason to return the CD. I'm pretty sure I bought it in an airport, probably on the way to New York. However, embarrassingly, it's probably on here primarily because of its use as the music during the first pan across the city in Omikron: the Nomad Soul, a PC game one gimmick of which was the involvement of il Bowie. It looks massively dated now, but at the time of its release Omikron was genuinely exciting in its attempts to create a consistent world that could be explored with a degree of freedom. OK, it was French. It was a French PC game. Innovative, whimsical, attractive, ultimately unplayable. Happy now?
Miss Prissy – Lambchop - very much the last chicken in the shop. By no means a bad song, but clearly stuck on the end as nothing more than a depressive coda. For practical purposes, I think this mix probably ends at "Cannonball".
It's scary just how closely these songs map to specific people, moments or reminiscences - recollections have in certain cases been emended or amended to protect the innocent. God, I'm a geek. Maybe a simple track listing would have been more memeable, but then what would the point have been in that? Then again, what exactly was the point of this wander down High Fidelity lane?
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