We’ve spent the last (check time since last post) up to all sorts… Oh, the stories we could tell, if only we had a suitable outlet for those stories, which I’m pretty sure we don’t.

Anyway, here’s a quick message to highlight the following items of mild Steve Show Posse-related interest…

Rufus is currently appearing in the wildly triumphant run of The 39 Steps at London’s fashionable Criterion Theatre. 

A night of big laughs and reasonably priced interval ice-creams is guaranteed – tickets available here, get them before they’re gone…

The microscopic Venn diagram intersection that comprises Steve Show fans and football supporters will be elated to learn that Dan will be taking a sideways glance at tomorrow’s transfer deadline activity on LiveWire Sports’ all-new Deadline Day website.  He will also be offering full frontal views and sneaky rear-shots. 

Sammy has been at Leeds festival… while we await reports, why not try to create your own Sammy festival story using the following words…

Wellie-Slash-Fishtank; Jarvis’s Glasses; Glitter Stew; Banjo Unorthodoxy; Tentally Ill; Man With Small Ears; Loose-Fitting Goggles; Noodle Smoothie; I Befriended An Owl; etc

Harry, freed from the requirement to occasionally admit to liking things on the radio, has now settled back into hating everything, and is much happier as a result.

Steve, as you’re no doubt aware, has a massive stand-up tour starting in September and running until early December.  Incredibly not sponsored by Lemsip or the concept of having a little lie down in the afternoon, Steve’s tour will be coming to a town near you soon.  Why not buy some tickets?  If you already have some, why not buy some more?

Of course, Steve has an official website where you can find all the very latest Steve news – please don’t sit here, wildly mashing the F5 button in the forlorn hope of being the first to discover some red hot Steve titbits. 

So that’s the latest.  Thanks for coming by. 

H.

Steve, in fairness, does likewise and has often brought little-known artists such as Bruce Springsteen, Neil Young and The Beatles to my attention, for which I am eternally grateful.

Anyway, by virtue of being a 6 Music ‘jock’ and being sent all kinds of free stuff, Steve was able to up his game and introduce me to the joys of Built To Spill, a band that I’d shamefully managed to overlook.

For the uninitiated, Built to Spill’s sound revolves around three guitars and veers from laid back & dreamy to insistent & snarly.  It’s never less than fascinating, often thrilling, and Doug Martsch’s high-pitched vocal recalls Death Cab For Cutie’s Ben Gibbard (who apparently cites BtS as an influence).

Doug Martsch, Built To Spill.......Ron Burgundy, Ready To Hurl

The last time I saw Dinosaur Jr was during their first reunion tour in 2005.  It was unbelievably loud, like being beaten around the head with a mid-sized bungalow, and I walked away with little recollection of the evening, save for a ringing in the ears that will no doubt return to haunt me in later life.

As the roadies wheel on more and more amps for tonight’s set, I’m patting myself on the back, carrying myself head high through the crowd and drenching myself with a massive celebratory bucket of Gatorade, safe in the knowledge that this time I’ve come prepared.

The young, devil-may-care Harry would be appalled, but old, let’s-just-sit-down-and-have-a-biscuit Harry couldn’t give a shit about that snivelling little idiot, which is why he’s proudly wearing earplugs to a gig.

I’ll concede it’s not fashionable or sexy, and listening through earplugs is like watching through a net curtain, but if it means that 83-year old Harry is at least able to hear the bus coming before it runs him over, I’ll be happy.        

The set has moved on since those reunion shows – rather than being tied to the early albums we also get picks from the two (excellent) new albums, a blistering Feel The Pain and a triumphant Freak Scene, amongst other treats.

J Mascis, looking for all the world like Iggy Pop’s glamourous younger sister, peels off 747-sized riffs and glorious, squally solos, while Lou Barlow looks like he’s having the time of his life on bass, a world apart from the nervous figure he cuts at solo shows.

The ludicrous 10.30 curfew (in order to make way for the indie disco) means we only get a one-song encore, but I’m probably the only one left disappointed.  The rest of the audience stumble out into the night, wondering what just happened, and why Oxford’s buses have fallen silent.

Sure, we’ve occasionally popped our pretty little heads out from our Sonic Youth slankets for long enough to toss out the odd wordy nugget, but we’ve mostly kept ourselves to ourselves while waiting for sunshine and the tunes that will form the soundtrack to a summer of frisbee championships, barbecue riots and outdoors baby-making.

The first such tune to come our way is the all-new single from The Bitter Springs – My Life As A Dog In A Pigsty.

If you didn’t pay attention last time, then listen up now and listen up good – no-one else is making records like this at the moment, and you need to be involved for your own good.

Propelled by guest Terry Edwards’ (Tindersticks, Nick Cave, PJ Harvey, etc) majestic trumpet, My Life… combines warmth, wisdom and high comedy in the tale of a young man’s turbulent life, all set to a majestic tune.  To hell and Bacharach*, you might say. 

Of course, it’s yet another song about breaking up with the missus after she discovers your inter-species affair with the family’s pet dog Beyonce, of empathising with terrorists after getting off at the wrong stop in Canary Wharf, and of rhyming slang carveries (Jean Claude? Penelope?**), so if you’ve heard enough of those sort of songs, don’t bother.  The kids on Glee probably did one like it last week.

And if you’ve ever been given better advice than ”Pray to whoe’er you choose, keep one good pair of shoes, some you’ll win, some you’ll lose“, then you can pass too.

But for everyone else (ie everyone), this is a wonderful record, blighted only by the fact it’s not getting a physical release.  You can buy it online from Monday at Amazon, Play and iTunes, and by doing so improve the quality of your life by several notches.

And if you’re going to be in London this weekend, The Bitter Springs are playing a frustratingly rare gig at the Wilmington Arms on Saturday night (the 24th) – buy your ticket in advance here or hope that there are some left on the night.

And now it’s back! I, Tiny Dan, with my limited height and ropey command of English will present to you some lyrics from popular music rewritten, as I imagine, by the mind of Super-Posh Rufus.

Rufus quite rightly pointed out to me that the last attempt was rather more like Viz legend Mr Logic with words simply substituted for other words – so, this time, I’ve tried to genuinely ‘Posh It Up’. Once-listeners to the Steve Show, imagine S-P Rufus reading these lyrical conundrums to you.

Also, last time, the quiz was frankly far too easy – especially since I’d suggested the winner might win a million quid. So, this time I think it’s tougher.

The prize is either a mention in the comments section at the bottom of this page, or a Tropical Ireland. Yes, that’s right, a Tropical Ireland. Because I’m a bit drunk, I’ve typed it wrong. But I’ll stick with it – a Tropical Ireland. So, get this right and you might win the country of Ireland which I will then tow towards the equator for the favourable climate contained therein*.

Same rules as before. Here follows four song lyrics rendered in Super-Posh language. If you can return them to their original state, tell me about it, using the form at the bottom of the page.

UPDATE 12-03-10 – this exciting internet-inferno-ising competition is now closed. Answers below.

Super-Posh Lyric #1 – Get Outta My Dreams, Get Into My Car by William “Billy” Ocean
I say! (I say!) You! (You!) You there! Young lady! Young lady! I say! Young lady! I say!
(Hey! (Hey!) You! (You!))
Are you referring to my own person?
(Who me?)
I am! Indubitably! Enter my motorised vehicle immediately – and without delay.
(Yes you! Get into my car)
Woo! Wah! Affirmative!
(Woo! Wah! Yeah!)

Super-Posh Lyric #2 – Pull Up To The Bumper by Graceford “Grace” Jones
Perambulating around this urban environment
(Driving down those city streets)
Currently in abeyance ahead of future cavorting
(Waiting to get down)
Would you be awfully kind and produce your hulking apparatus?
(Won’t you get your big machine?)
Which is, I believe, located with this conurbation?
(Somewhere in this town)

Super Posh Lyric #3 – Because I Got High by Alfred “Afroman” Moorthwaite
It was my intention to engage in conjugal relations with you – but I became intoxicated
(I was gonna make love to you but then I got high)
I fully intended to devour your kitten as well – but, regretfully, I entered a state of inebriation
(I was gonna eat yo pussy too – but then I got high)
At this moment, I am currently involved in an act of onanism, and I am fully aware of how this situation came to pass
(Now I’m jacking off and I know why)
It came to pass because I became delirious on a form of either Colombian, Jamaican, Maui or Panamanian wowie and I fear it caused some kind of freak out
(Because I got high, because I got high, because I got high)

Super-Posh Lyric #4 – Peaches by The Stranglers
I have obtained from somewhere (precisely whencetofore, I am regretfully unsure) young lady, the idea that you are in possession of a chemical unguent which will enable me to filter harmful UV rays – and that said embrocation is currently situated within the carafe which is currently about you
(Well I got the notion girl that you got some suntan lotion in that bottle of yours)
Would you be so kind as to extend and proliferate some of the aforementioned liniment upon my desquamating epidermis?
(Spread it all over my peeling skin baby)
Ah, that is a most satisfactory sensation
(That feels real good)
Goodness. A preponderance of doxies appear to be revelling in the brilliance of the day
(All this skirt – lapping up the sun)
Make whoopee with me, I implore!
(Lap me up)
What good reason can there be for not engaging with this?
Go on a spree with my own self!
(Why don’t you come on and lap me up?)

(* Please note, the prize will be either a Tropical Ireland, as described above, or a mention in the space below this article on the page. I’ll decide on the day, but given the logistics of moving an entire country half-way around the globe, it’s likely to be the mention, to be fair)
~(Addition 12-03-10 – yup, it was the mention)~

Erstwhile home of The Steve Show and favourite radio station of everyone who likes music, 6 Music is to be shut down by the BBC.

In a strategy report released today, the BBC announced that 6 Music and the Asian Network are to close, along with cutbacks to their website and various other tinkerings.

I fell in love with 6 Music the first time I turned on my brand new DAB radio and heard them playing Husker Du.  No-one plays Husker Du.  I woke up to the grumpy mumblings of Phill Jupitus, I nodded off to Marc Riley in the evenings, and often considered throwing a sickie just to tune in to the brilliant Gideon Coe.

And then, incredibly, we got the gig!  Where else would a bunch of utterly unqualified hangers-on like us be allowed to broadcast for two hours a week on national radio?  Apart from talkSPORT, maybe?

Now don’t get me wrong – 6 Music isn’t perfect.  I’ve never understood the point of 6 Music News Music News, the playlist can be a bit annoying during the week, and then there’s George Lamb.  Also, it took them ages to sort out our passes for the building, the security guards on reception were useless, and finding a pair of headphones that worked was always the toughest assignment of the afternoon.

6 also had a big part to play in the rise and rise of ‘landfill indie’, the dreary corporate alterno-fodder used in the trails for every E4 show.

But by playing interesting, often challenging stuff that you really don’t hear anywhere else, by giving a platform to hundreds of lesser-known artists to play live sessions, and by having some of the most musically articulate and passionate DJs around, 6 Music really is unique.  Maconie’s FreakZone?  The Craig Charles Funk & Soul Show?  The aforementioned Coe and Riley? Garvey, Cocker, Robinson?

And yet it has to go.  The BBC is shutting down a station that could not exist in the commercial world.  We sometimes received bleating emails from unhinged listeners carping on about how playing something that they didn’t like was somehow against the remit of the station, which was obviously bollocks, but at least proved the passion of the station’s supporters.  Today’s decision, to me, flies in the face of the remit of the BBC.  

If they’re going to shut anything down (in what is, let’s face it, a pre-emptive strike against a BBC-hostile Tory government which may not even be voted in), it should really be Radio1 – there are countless commercial stations that replicate the output of Radio1, and the cost saving would be off the scale of anything announced today.

Of course, everyone should join the Facebook group, but frankly, once businesses make decisions like this, they tend not to change them.  You might as well join a group appealing for the return of New Coke, or the abolition of Tuesdays. 

If I’ve learnt anything over the last 12 months, it’s that no matter how inept a business decision, the individuals responsible will fall behind it and defend it to the death, and hope that people eventually just give up the fight.

But wait – what’s this?  The chairman of the BBC Trust has said that the decision could be overturned if there is ‘massive public concern’.  And absurd shadow culture spokesman Ed Vaizey is now apparently a huge 6Music fan.

So take to the streets.  Daub pro-Nemone slogans on your duvet covers and hang them from motorway bridges.  Don Shaun Keaveney facemasks and storm the town halls of this fair land.  Raze the studios of XFM to the ground and dissect the corpses with sharpened Fall CDs. 

Let’s save 6Music.

No one would have believed in the early years of the 21st century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences far weaker than those of most people.

But they were – on Sunday afternoons, by a little-loved posse on obscure digital radio station 6Music hoping for something in the news they could take a sideways glance at in order to please celebrity show overlord Stephen Merchant.

I, dear reader, I, Tiny Dan, was the most unpopular of that posse. Yet despite the vitriol, the protests and the car bombs sent my way it was my dream job – because I got to occasionally play one record during the show (which I couldn’t always attend owing to other work commitments).

Steve was famously stern about what was and what wasn’t acceptable, but I always thought his need for things like ‘melody’ and ‘meaning’ were foolish.

After all, what use is pop music if it can’t occasionally be overblown, pretentious, nonsensical and brilliant.

Jeff Wayne’s Musical Version of War of the Worlds is all of these.

It’s a stupid concept. A prog-rock influenced take on a Victorian novel imagining an attack by Martians. Him off of The Moody Blues is involved. David Essex too. Phil Lynott. Richard Burton. Richard fricking Burton! Seriously, if the album wasn’t so well-known, you’d assume I’d used a random name generator to help me make this up.

The final work is utterly, insanely, gloriously, wonderfully over the top. I’d not heard it since the days my dad’s vinyl copy was on heavy rotation on the family Tiny Dan turntable (yes, I used to sit on it, like it was all some kind of dang playground roundabout).

I’ve since digitally downloaded it and was struck by how J.Wayne absolutely goes for it. Twelve-minute D. Essex track with military electronic percussion? Check (Brave New World). Tear-jerking bona fide hit for ex Moody Blue? Check (Forever Autumn). Staggeringly brilliant opener with orchestral riff to die for? Check (The Eve of the War).

Sure, he must have got a bit lucky. I’ve no idea how he got R.Burton on board, but the many-wived Welshman could invest a Chicken Cottage takeaway menu with gravitas, if he recited it. He also gets some magnificent yelping from P.Lynott and he must have rustled up an extraordinary synthesizer budget from somewhere.

That last one brings me to this particular track (at last – word count Ed). As well as being bonkers, JWMVOWOTW is undeniably influential.

And The Red Weed is as beautiful and unsettling a piece of electronica as you’ll have heard before or since.

There’s a genuine strangeness to it – an unearthliness if you will (Nice – Martian-themed puns Ed) – perfect given the context of the tune (at the point in the story where Martian ‘red weed’ begins to take over the English countryside).

I’m not aware of any subtext, any hidden meanings here. Just a spooky refrain aurally illustrating an imagined spooky view. And weirdly lovely with it.

* Tiny Dan postscript – fans of live performances of crazy prog-rockish concept albums based on Victorian novels might like to know that they’re still doing this thing live. Sadly, they’ve brought in an Atomic Kitten and a Neighbours. Him off the Moody Blues is still there mind, while Richard Burton has been replaced by, er, an 11-foot hologram of Richard Burton.

Have you ever been replaced by an 11-foot hologram of Richard Burton? Maybe you were obliterated by a martian heat-ray in the late 19th Century? Or perhaps you led a hostile invasion of another world and set about exterminating the dominant race before falling foul of the new world’s tiny bacteria. D’oh! Tell me about it. Go on. Dare you.

There’s a pile of vinyl next to the record player that I haven’t even dared to attack yet, so let’s start off with some comfy old favourites, bands you can return to album after album in the knowledge that you’ll get some tasty treats…

I shouldn’t really like The Magnetic Fields of course.  The synths and a frustrating propensity towards novelty have tended to irk, but the tunes, the wonderfully arch lyrics and Stephin Merritt’s world-weary baritone always draw me back.  This time, the credits proudly state ‘no synths’ (just like Queen did back in 1973), and Merritt takes his fare share of vocal duties. 

The bar is set pretty high on opening track You Must Be Out Of Your Mind, a trademark shuffling melody accompanied by a creamy croon and, in the first verse, the wonderful ‘I want you crawling back to me, Down on your knees, yeah; Like an appendectomy, Sans anasthesia’.  Ace.

We Are Having A Hootenanny might be poking fun at Scientology but definitely sounds like something from The Muppet Show.  So it’s good, obviously.  But is it as good as The Swedish Chef doing Yes, We Have No Bananas?  You decide…

Click here for We Are Having A Hootenanny Now by The Magnetic Fields (opens in a new window for your reading pleasure)

So, we have another reassuringly lovely Magnetic Fields album – better than previous effort Distortion, not as good as 1995′s synth-tastic Get Lost, if you want to slip it into some theoretical MF league table in your brain.  If you haven’t got any Magnetic Fields, don’t be tempted to begin with 69 Love Songs – it’s their most well-known record but there’s just too much to get through, and some of the filler will have you punching yourself in the face with frustration.  Realism is a good a place as any to start.

Gloom-core, mope-rock, jazz-sob, you can try to pin down Tindersticks but you’ll never quite nail it. 

After a triumphant first three albums (First, Second and Curtains), a shift to a more soulful sound, a messy break-up in 2006, singer Stuart Staples (who almost out-baritones Stephin Merritt) releasing a couple of solo albums and an eventual rebirth with three of the original six members, Tindersticks have, against the odds, made their best record in years.

I could get all CSI on your ass and give you some rigourous analysis of the record but this ain’t Vibraphone Sniffer’s Monthly, so let’s just say it’s a great Tindersticks album.  It has to be, as all of their classic constituent parts are there…

Woozy instrumental – check (Hubbards Hills), Morricone-esque rattler – check (She Rode Me Down), delicate piano ballad – check (Factory Girls), duet with a nice lady – check (the endearingly goofy Peanuts, with Mary Margaret O’Hara). 

It’s top-notch stuff, with the added bonus of a song that sounds just like Kim Wilde’s Kids In America.  Harmony Around My Table is its name, and it even has the temerity to break down halfway through and restart with handclaps.  Tindersticks gigs aren’t renowned for their audience participation (apart from the weeping), but this song could be the one to change all that.

Find out for yourself as they play Europe in February and March.  There are three UK shows  – Edinburgh 22/3, Manchester 23/3, and London, almost certainly with Tiny Dan and I in attendance, on 24/3…

In fact, I’d go as far to say that there’s not much to be gained in making fun of charity. 

There’s no money in it, it won’t increase your standing in the community (no-one ever got an MBE for making fun of Cancer Research), and should you become the victim of something terrible, those who would usually be the first to help – whether by donating money, a vital organ, or by badgering their colleagues to support them in their latest self-aggrandising Herculean feat of running/cycling/skydiving/farting the alphabet – would be well within their rights to thumb their noses, turn on their heels and leave you to wallow in your misery.

That said, this charity record that Simon Cowell’s organising – doesn’t it sound like a bag of toss?

Like JR, Stalin and Jeffrey Dahmer, Cowell is the man you love to hate.  He’s a mischievous chappy with a glint in his eye and a frighteningly small vocabulary, whose hatred of music knows no bounds.

To this end, he’s ruining the great efforts of the British people in helping the Haitian earthquake victims (£38m raised so far in a recession), by guilting them into buying what sounds like the worst record ever.

He’s organising a star-stunted cover of REM’s weepalong classic Everybody Hurts.  Not a bad song, by any means.  But let’s see who he’s managed to rope in so far…

Well, there’s Rod Stewart.  He’s a big name.  And Michael Buble.  Then there’s JLS and Leona Lewis (how on earth did he manage to get them?)  And, ummm, that’s it. 

Apparently Coldplay, Robbie Williams and Paul McCartney have been approached.  More likely to appear are those who have expressed an interest – uber-chinned nice guy Will Young, victorious X-Factor automo-gonk Joe McElderry and single-mother-text-threatening gormoloids NDubz.

Anyone who’s anyone has already donated to Emily Eavis’s rock memorabilia auction (Coldplay, Damon Albarn, Arctic Monkeys, Chemical Brothers, Pearl Jam, etc) or signed up to George Clooney’s massive US telethon (Bono and The Edge, Jay-Z, Rihanna, Bruce Springsteen, Mary J Blige, etc).

So Simon is left with nothing more than pop detritus with which to produce a charity smash.

It looks horribly like going the same way as 1987′s Ferry Aid single, hastily arranged to raise cash for the victims of the Zeebrugge tragedy.

Ferry Aid was organised by the Cowells of the day, the shadowy shit-pop collective Stock, Aitken and Waterman, and featured a motley crew (ferry pun not intended) of attention-seeking no-marks.

Paul McCartney gave permission for Let It Be to be used, but wisely only contributed vocals from the original 1970 recording sessions.  The rest was left to the likes of Paul King, Pepsi and Shirlie, Mel and Kim, Ben Volpeliere-Pierrot, Jaki Graham and the justifiably-forgotten Taffy.  If you are under the age of 30, you really shouldn’t know who any of these people are.

The highlight of Ferry Aid was undoubtedly the final chorus, honked by a haphazardly-assembled choir including Alvin Stardust, Doctor and the Medics, Go West, Bucks Fizz, The Nolan Sisters, Mandy Smith and Su Pollard (I’m genuinely not making this up).

Against all odds, and showing that the British public will support almost anything in the name of charity, it stayed at number one for 3 weeks and shifted just under half a million copies.

Will Cowell’s attempt do the same?  Probably.  People are generally quite nice and willing to put their hands in their pockets for a good cause.  But wouldn’t we all be better off if Cowell (estimated worth £112m) just handed over £3m of his own money and pissed off for a bit?

For anyone who’s bothered to read this far, I can provide an exclusive peek at the wish list for the song’s running order, showing who will be taking each line…

(Leona Lewis)                      When the day is long and the night, the night is yours alone,
(Michael Buble)                    When you’re sure you’ve had enough of this life, well hang on
(Rod Stewart)                      Don’t let yourself go, ’cause everybody cries

(Sisqo)                                  And everybody hurts sometimes

(Scouting For Girls)              Sometimes everything is wrong. Now it’s time to sing along
(JLS)                                     When your day is night alone, (hold on, hold on)
(Eamonn Holmes)                 If you feel like letting go, (hold on)
(Sir Trevor McDonald)          When you think you’ve had too much of this life, well hang on

(Simon Weston)                   ’Cause everybody hurts. Take comfort in your friends
(The Go Compare Ad Man)   Everybody hurts.

(Abu Hamza)                         Don’t throw your hand. Oh, no. Don’t throw your hand
(Loose Women)                    If you feel like you’re alone, no, no, no, you are not alone

(Sir Fred Goodwin)                If you’re on your own in this life, the days and nights are long,
(Jackiey Budden)                  When you think you’ve had too much of this life to hang on

(Amanda Holden)                  Well, everybody hurts sometimes,
(Louis Walsh)                        Everybody cries. And everybody hurts sometimes
(Simon Cowell & Sinitta)      And everybody hurts sometimes.

(Chorus comprised of the above plus Neil Tennant, David Tennant, Princess Superstar, Davina McCall, Nicholas Van Hoogstraaten, Lemar, Ricky Hatton, Elin Nordegen, Flat Eric, Eric Bristow, Bernie Eccleston and Bernie Madoff)

So, hold on, hold on
Hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on, hold on
Everybody hurts. You are not alone

Well, as an antidote to this rubbish one-twelfth of the year, here’s a fun activity which will help you pass up to and including five minutes of the month.

Last year, before I lost my dream job of occasionally appearing as an unpopular fourth member of a little-loved posse which made comments in the background on a Sunday afternoon radio show on a DAB station hosted by Stephen Merchant off of the telly, I forged an unlikely friendship with the far-more likeable Super-Posh Rufus.

It was an unusual bond, certainly. There I was, an open-mouthed bumpkin with straw in my ears, alongside the urbane, witty actor. I’m pretty sure I was little more than a Pygmalion-type experiment for him, or maybe a bet, like Eddie Murphy was to Ralph Bellamy in Trading Places. In any event, we had a few laughs.

And I took to wondering: What would today’s slang-filled, superficial pop lyrics sound like to his super-refined ears?

To that end, I built a massive supercomputer, which could translate said lyrics into the language of ‘Super-Posh’.

Here, I present four well-known lyrics after they have been fed through the translator. Your task is to translate them back into the original English. I’ll smash up the actual answers here on Monday.

Post your answers below, and I’ll give the winner either a million pounds or a short sentence explaining why they won (it’s a 50/50 chance, I’ll choose on the day).

UPDATE 18/01/10 – This competition has now closed, the answers are below.

Super-Posh Lyric #1 – Billie Jean by Michael Jackson
I’m rather afraid it’s my solemn duty to report that Ms William Jeannette is not, as has been stated elsewhere, my paramour
(Billie Jean is not my lover)

Rather, she is merely a damsel, and furthermore, one who has made a false claim to my exclusivity
(She’s just a girl who claims that I am the one)

Unfortunately, for the purposes of clarity and veracity, I must stress that the infant to which Ms Jeannette refers is most indubitably not my male offspring
(But the kid is not my son)

Once again – Ms Jeannette has made a claim uponst my exclusivity, but sirs, I reinforce the sentiment that the juvenile has little or nothing in the way of blood ties to my own good self
(She says I am the one, but the kid is not my son)

Super-Posh Lyric #2 – Three is the Magic Number by De La Soul
Thrice
(3)
That amount, sir, is – to my mind – an amount equivalent to an act of conjuring
(That’s the magic number)
Indeed!
(Yes it is)
It is an amount pertaining to wonderousness and extraordinarytude
(It’s the magic number)
It is understood by myself that there is a location within this youthful body politic (which accommodates the music of rap, the dancing of break, and also the art of graffito)
(Somewhere in this hip-hop soul community)
Wherein the natal day of thrice and my most excellent companions Mase and Dove took place – alongside my own
(Was born 3, Mase, Dove and me)
And that is the numerical which mystifies
(And that’s the magic number)

(I say, I’m awfully confused by this)
(What does it all mean?)

Super-Posh Lyric #3 – Girls and Boys by Blur
Lassies, who are chaps, who are well-disposed to striplings resembling doxies, who perform whippersnappers as though they were sweet things, who take on the form of tootsies to all ends and purposes resembling fellows
(Girls who want boys who like boys to be girls who do boys like they’re girls who do girls like they’re boys)

Perenially, one must ensure that one’s heart is a-flutter
(Always should be someone you really love)

(I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say, I say)
(oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh)

Super-Posh Lyric #4 – Forgot about Dre by Eminem
The current fashion is for people to indulge in vehement oratory, creating the impression of pertinence
(Nowadays everybody wanna talk like they got somethin’ to say)
However, the motion of their lips is moot; they produce little in the way of improvement
(But nothin’ comes out when they move their lips)
Rather, they emit pure, unadulterated balderdash
(Just a bunch of gibberish)
Also, these mater fornicaters foolishly appear to have forgotten about Dre
(And these rotten eggs act like they forgot about Dre)

Tune in for more preposterous translations of popular music next time!

However, that’s not to say that I haven’t noticed certain things (at a rate of 1 every 2.5 years), which I could write in list form below, complete with supporting arguments and questionable grammar…

1. Things keep getting smaller.

Oh, we used to have lovely big records, which became nasty little CDs, which briefly threatened to become even tinier and less loveable minidiscs, and now we have mp3s which are so small that YOU CAN’T SEE THEM AT ALL.

My first iPod was the size of a shirehorse, and if I wanted to take it out with me I would have to strap it to my back and attach counterbalancing weights to my chest to stop me from falling backwards.  But then came the itty-bitty Nano and the even smaller Shuffle.  And all the time the standard iPod kept shrinking.  Now they can put them in phones, which means that they are so small that YOU CAN’T SEE THEM AT ALL.

TV’s used to be massive.  Do you remember massive TVs?  Do you?  You do? Weren’t they huge?  Not the screens obviously – they were little bulbous affairs that made your eyes septic – but all of the gubbins round the back.  TVs were so mind-thumpingly futuristic that they had to carry a big, hot, glowing box of science behind them to power their magic.  If you wanted one with teletext, you had to buy one that was so enormous due to the many wires, valves and pulleys that powered it, that the screen ended up looking like the sticker off an apple, stuck onto a car-park.

But now the clever bits have been crushed down to the size of nothing, and even though the screens are massive, if you stand to the side and look at them from the wrong angle, YOU CAN’T SEE THEM AT ALL.

And this unarguable point can be observed throughout our daily lives.  In the 90’s we all used to live in castles and eat whole pigs for breakfast, whereas now we live in individual life-pods and subsist for a month on a spoonful of macrobiotic yoghurt. 

In the 90’s we all had hair that was massive and we drove lorries, now we’re all slapheads in Nissan Micras.

If the march of technology continues unabated, soon we’ll all be commuting in tiny, one-man trains to an office which is too small for us to get into, where we think up marketing campaigns for billboards that are invisible to the naked eye, for products that we keep losing because YOU CAN’T SEE THEM AT ALL.  

In my view, that would be a bad thing.

2. The Demise Of The Record Shop.

In the 90’s, independent record shops were living the dream – Nirvana and Pearl Jam created a new generation of rock fans, Oasis v Blur made the evening news, Echobelly v Shed Seven made page 12 of the Stockport Gazette, and people couldn’t stop going out and buying their records.

And there were a bunch of big record stores too – Our Price, HMV, Virgin, MVC – a savvy record buyer could shop around, maybe getting 30p off the recommended retail price of a single, a free Roxette keyring, or an exclusive papier-mache replica of Morrissey’s chin with their copy of Bona Drag.

Nowadays, we all steal music online and the record shops are dying.  93% of the independent stores have been closed down and turned into Pound Shops.  Our Price, MVC and Virgin are long gone, and asking for something non-chart from the music section in HMV (usually hidden away at the back of the store behind a wall of Michael McIntyre DVDs) is like going into Anne Summers and asking for a lifesize blow-up Alsatian, such is the look of disdain you’re likely to get from the shop assistant.

So support your independent stores while you can, for they may not be around for much longer. 

Remember, without record stores there would be no High Fidelity.  Instead we’d have a film solely about a guy downloading Annie Lennox b-sides from a file-sharing service, for 93 minutes.  Booooring.

3. Excessive and Unfair Guilt by Association.

A handful of bankers make a few piffling blunders and wreck the world economy, and we all get the blame for it. 

It’s just not fair.

Telling people that you work in a bank these days is like telling people that you’re the guy who tests perfume by dripping it into the eyeballs of live toddlers.  It’s dinner party hell, and you can’t even get a decent bonus anymore to pay for protection.

Luckily, as I’m now unemployed, I no longer get invited to dinner parties, as potential hosts fear that I’ll eat them out of house and home, nick their cutlery and start living rough in their front garden.

So why did everyone in the banking industry get tarred with the same brush?  I mean, just because Gary Glitter was found guilty of all that stuff, it doesn’t mean you’d instantly point the finger at other figures from pop in the 70’s like Jonathan King and that bloke out of the Bay City Rollers, does it?

OK, bad example, but you get my drift.

4. Aren’t gigs expensive these days?

As ways of acquiring music got cheaper, so gigs became ever more expensive. 

Once a cheap way to see a band to find out whether or not you liked them, gigs are fast becoming for the devout fan only, with casual punters unlikely to shell out £23 plus booking fee, plus delivery fee, plus paper & ink fee to see a bunch of chippy blokes with 3 good songs who got a mention in the NME six months ago.

And because gigs are packed with happy-clapping fans, there’s no-one available to pipe up and heckle if the band is rubbish.  Have we really moved forward as a species if no-one is prepared to throw a Doc Marten full of warm piss at a moody bass player anymore?

I saw some great shows in the noughties though.  Radiohead in South Park, Oxford in 2001.  The Night Marchers at San Diego’s Casbah in 2008.  The Strokes at the Hard Rock Café in Las Vegas in 2006.  The Bellrays, The Dirtbombs and Rocket From the Crypt on the same bill at Bristol’s short-lived Essential Festival in 2002.

The best one was probably Foo Fighters in the tiny 400-capacity Dingwalls in Camden in 2007.  Having found out from someone at work that there was a fans-only gig going down that night, I decided to mobilise the full force of The Steve Show, with notoriously crazy producer Jude putting in some calls and getting Steve and I on the guestlist. 

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgkYhQqpyfc

I should point out that this was pretty much the only time that working on the show got us a juicy bonus like this.

Even so, I know what you’re thinking – it’s a sad indictment of the record industry when a fan-only gig is gatecrashed by a pair of corporate shills like us (especially as the fans didn’t get to go to the pre-show reception where Dave talked about the new album while we munched on canapés and necked free beer).

But in fairness, I had always been a massive fan of the Food Fighters, ever since lead singer David Gray left his old band New Order following the death of their drummer, Bernard Bresslaw.

So, erm, in summary, aren’t gigs expensive these days?  Ahem.

Conclusion.

In the 2010’s, the Teenies, the Tweenies, the Tenties, whatever you want to call them, I think we can all now agree that we’d like to see

• things get bigger, or at least maintain their current size;
• an environment where record shops prosper and flourish again;
• people, like, you know, calming down a bit;
• gigs becoming more affordable for bladder-challenged boot-hurlers.

This is my manifesto, and I look forward to receiving your vote in May.