OK, SO I STOLE THIS THEME....
Sometimes, you read something somewhere else and wish you'd thought of it first.
My dear friend Dirk over at Sexy Loser has been posting all sorts of great stuff in recent months based on songs he first heard on the John Peel shows broadcast on Armed Services radio in Germany. Now his latest posting is what I hope will be the first of a regular series in which he focuses in on a particular year and chooses his favourite songs from a particular 12 month period.
He's started with 1976.....and he's picked five absolute belters that cover a range of genres. He's even been kind enough to provide links to the songs, and I thoroughly recommend that you take a look by clicking here.
I think its an idea worth stealing, and I hope Dirk doesn't mind. But I won't go through everything in a chronological order....instead I'll now and then go for a random year and give you four songs that I think are pretty special - and most importantly, haven't been featured before on TVV (although I might get it occasionally wrong for I don't keep a list and with more than 1500 already been made available before now, the odd repeat might creep in). They might not necessarily be my favourites songs from that particular year, but hey, its my blog and I'll make up whatever rules suit me at whatever time.
And I'm going to kick off with 1984. The year that I turned 21 years of age on the very day that Paul McCartney turned 42. Since then, I've been less that half the age of the lovable moptop....and the frightening thing is that he probably now looks younger than me.
It was a year when George Orwell was again all the rage thanks to every single newspaper columnist talking about his book and analysing just how much he had got right and how much he had got wrong. It was also the year when these first came to our attention:-
mp3 : Everything But The Girl - Each And Everyone
mp3 : Lloyd Cole & The Commotions - Are You Ready To Be Heartbroken?
mp3 : Billy Bragg - The Saturday Boy
mp3 : Elvis Costello & The Attractions - Turning The Town Red
Its kinda obvious that I was a student isn't it???
I dont think I imagined back then, that 24 years on, Tracy, Lloyd, Billy & Elvis would all still be recording and touring. Nor that I would still be listening to them....
Incidentally, the EC track was the theme song to Scully, a fantastic TV series written by Alan Bleasdale. Over at the Video Villain, I've shoved up a classic clip of when our hero is getting ready to go out on his dream date. Still makes me laugh and cringe....
Happy Listening (and viewing).
7 comments:
great idea JC, I've been peeking over at Dirk's posts too, amazing stuff! And yes, I'm surprised to realize that those great artists are still putting out the goods, so to say. I turned 20 that year, and like you, never thought "our" music would last. xoxo
I'd forgotten Scully. Wow. That takes me back.
I was 15 that year. One of my worst years ever for all sorts of reasons. Including hating a lot of the music that was about. EBTG, Billy and Lloyd were, alongside Weller, pretty much the only contemporary artists I was listening to at the time. 1984 for me was the year my local record shop closed down. Prior to closing they let me for about six weeks go through all their old stock of singles. A stock dating from 1969 - 1984, with the bulk of it coming from the punk/new wave era.
"I dont think I imagined back then, that 24 years on, Tracy, Lloyd, Billy & Elvis would all still be recording and touring. Nor that I would still be listening to them...."
Now imagine what that sentence will look like 24 years from today.
"I dont think I imagined back then, that 24 years on, Beyonce, Britney, 50-Cent and Madonna would all still be recording and touring. Nor that I would still be listening to them...."
You gotta admit, Madonna still touring at the age of 74 would be quite the achievement!
Please note however that the above sentence does not reflect my personal tastes, nor the tastes of anybody I would associate with. I'm more of a Peter Andre, Michael Bolton, Celine Dion kinda girl.
I am fairly well ashamed of what I listened to in 1984...even though I was 12 and stupid at the time.
The Lloyd Cole and Elvis Costello tracks are only 10 seconds long ...
All seems fine with the file anon.....anyone else got a problem??
I was 16 in 1984 and listened to Each & Every One (and the lovely B side Laugh You Out The House) approximately 40,000 times that year. Seems like in recent years the obscure EBTG B sides have been dribbling out on CD, but I've never been able to locate Charmless Callous Ways from the 12" of one of the singles off Love Not Money, it escapes me which for now... If anyone knows where it can be tracked down I'd be more than somewhat interested to hear... :)
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