280281 (Part Two)

Continuing on from numbers 30-21, in which we find a number of songs I actually really like...

#30 - The Freeze – Spandau Ballet
Second single from leading lights of the New Romantic movement. For a band typically associated with synths and other electronic tricks, this is fairly guitar heavy, leaning towards the funk/soul influences they’d perfect on the Chant #1 hit later on, with a slight Bowie tint.

As a single, it’s nothing special and probably hit the top 20 on the back of media hype. More interesting is the video, which is worth it for cheap giggles at Tony Hadley’s stubble/shades/moody look and Gary Kemp trying to look all serious in a string vest.
　
#29 – Reward – The Teardrop Explodes
This is much more like it. I remember I heard this for the first time on some New Wave compilation album I picked up aged 14 or so. It’s possibly one of the most instant songs I’ve ever heard, the horn riff and Cope’s proclamation of ‘Bless my cotton socks, I’m in the news!’ ensuring a love for the band that remains to this day.

Though they had better songs, this was their biggest hit by a mile and deservedly so: it’s the classic pop song in all respects. Part of it becoming such a big hit may have been a first appearance on ‘Top of the Pops’ where Cope admitted he and one or two other band members were off their heads on LSD. Just a shame the band couldn’t keep it together to earn the status afforded to rivals Echo and the Bunnymen.

#28 – A Little In Love – Cliff Richard
I find it hard to think of Cliff without wondering if it would be funny if he really was a cliff, and the fascists kept trying to push him over. Also, I still remember the laughs of derision from my dad whenever a mention of him being "the British Elvis" was heard.

Cliff was on a roll at the time, scoring top 20 hits for fun in the US, though this would be his last. Like most of his songs, it’s bland to the point of being transparent – when he coos "I need you so", he sounds about as convincing as the Pope advertising durex. It’s all wrapped in a MOR package that shows off it’s commercial appeal: you can imagine middle aged couples from Arkansas to Aylesbury smiling contently at each other as it plays on the radio.

#27 – Rapture – Blondie
Not my favourite Blondie song by a long shot. Viewing it alongside the other significant rock/rap crossover song of the time, the Clash’s The Magnificent Seven (released a couple of months later), it seems fairly lumbering.

Debbie Harry’s nonsense lyrics may have had a kookiness, but next to Strummer railing against capitalist systems and consumerism, there’s no comparison. Where it does win over is the commercial stakes: this sold by the bucket load and doubtlessly introduced a lot of people to an emerging musical genre. So, kudos for that if nothing else, and it’s worth adding Debbie looks fab on the cover, as always.

#26 – Four from Toyah EP – Toyah
First hit for the Brummie screamer, who I remember having a weird crush on about 12 years ago. It’s a Mystery is the one that got the airplay.

What does struck me is that she sounds like a more mainstream Siouxese Sioux, but the actual band are more workmanlike than the innovative Banshees. I would wager that it’s hit status owes a lot to Toyah’s image values than any songwriting skills. It plods along in second gear, while you wait for something to kick on. Which it never does, obviously.

#25 – I’m In Love With a German Film Star – Passions
Great title, great song. Another one-hit wonder, but this deserves better status than that label would suggest. The guitars sound fucking light years ahead of the time, Barbara Gogan sings about a guy she "once saw in a movie" in detached tones.

Really, in a just would this would have made #1. Not even making the top 20? Fuck off, the British public. Go listen to this song now, if you haven’t heard it before.

#24 – Once In a Lifetime – Talking Heads
While their homeland weren’t too keen on Remain In Light, it proved to be a breakthrough here, cracking the top 20. It was also my introduction to the band: I remember seeing the video on VH-1 as a 15-year-old or so and being taken by David Byrne’s dancing and the high anxiety in his voice as he wailed "how did I get here?"

It works on its simplicity, like a lot of their songs, and it’s all about Byrne. Questioning the American dream (nice house, nice car) and going on about water on the moon – Byrne manages to keep it together long enough to see the song out. Top notch song from a top notch album.

#23 – Imagine – John Lennon
John Winston had only been expired for a couple of months or so at this point and the sentimentality for his death hadn’t gone away just yet (as we shall see more later). I don’t feel I need to write anything about Imagine – for good or bad, it’s all been said before.

#22 – Somebody (Help Me Out) – Beggar & Co.
It seems funk was enjoying a peak in the charts at this time. This is the British variety from a band perhaps better known for providing the horn section on several hits for other acts, notably the aforementioned Chant #1 for Spandau Ballet.

The main touchstones here, influence wise, seem to be Earth, Wind and Fire. Unlike the numbers elsewhere in the chart, the bass here rocks pretty well. The vocals do little but chant slogans in a sub-James Brown way, and the horns avoid that wretched 80s sound that would plague many a record. Not the best of it’s type, but compared to what we’ve seen so far, a vast improvement.

#21 – That’s Entertainment – The Jam
It’s hard for me to remain impartial, given how much I love the run of Jam singles from Down The Tube Station at Midnight to their concluding Beat Surrender. They’re a huge part of the soundtrack to my life aged 15-20 and this song (along with A Town Called Malice) is one I return to the most, perhaps because it less sums up the mood of being the age Weller was at the time.

This was also helped by a period in my mid 20s when I was living in "a freezing cold flat with damp on the wall", though I would wager the man himself (being in a hit making band of four years by this point) never had to sleep on a sofa bed in his jacket just to keep warm. Cue violins.

For all that, he does sound like he means it and by keeping the Buckler and Foxton’s contributions to a minimum produces a superior Jam acoustic moment to English Rose. That it was the only single by the Jam from David Watts onwards (13 singles, by my count) not to crack the top 20, due it being an import, shows just how huge they were at the time.

In 2010, Weller is the only one of the class of ’77 who still holds even vague credibility with a large group of people. Strummer is gone, Lydon has long since become a kind of figure of fun and Costello ceased writing good songs sometime in the late 80s. Despite his gruff obnoxiousness and mediocre solo albums of the last decade (or more, depending on your point of view), this shows him on the form when he actually did matter to a lot of people.