Archive for May, 2008

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The Ting Tings, ‘That’s Not My Name’

May 28, 2008

As the 1969 Top 20 hobbles to a thrilling conclusion, we’re hop-skip-jumping all the way to the present and a record that Junior went loopy for when it appeared on one of those new-fangled MTV channels last week. We’re even a bit slow off the mark here, as it’s been toppled from an unlikely chart summit by hit machine Rihanna, but it’s still the breakthrough smash of the year – a grand departure from its achingly hip, limited 2007 run.

You’ve heard the comparisons – Blondie (yes, the cool-eyed Katie White is indeed blonde and, in a slightly darkened room, stunning), ‘Mickey’ (the star-jumping rhythm and lairy rap-song straight off Toni Basil’s much mis-(or not)-construed 1982 chartbuster), The Knack’s ‘My Sharona’ (that rhythm again, really, also massaged for Girls Aloud’s ‘No Good Advice’) – but, like the best pop puffery, ‘That’s Not My Name’ blends influences to form a monster that stomps, jerks, twitters and rocks in its own nation-enslaving way.

We’re mad for it right now, pure victims of hype if you see things through those spectacles. Sometimes there’s no hype without fire. As the record builds to its multi-layered, full-rocking coda, Junior’s reaction is a spinning, leaping, head-shaking frug from dining room to living room – pop star in infancy.

And while we’re sojourning in 2008, here are some of her other recent pop moments:

- “She’s got hair like me” to Diana Ross gamely keeping it all together in the ‘Chain Reaction’ video
- “Black and gold, black and gold, black and gold – that’s your favourite, Daddy” (not sure who’s feeding her these lies)
- Sticking her hand in the washing machine for the nth time one day, she’s told to leave it alone before defiantly reaching in again and pulling out the new Isobel Campbell & Mark Lanegan album

For Junior, music is everywhere.

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[5] Smokey Robinson And The Miracles, ‘The Tracks Of My Tears’

May 23, 2008

Robinson always hit big at his most lachrymose – take this and the more sprightly, but no less woe-is-me, ‘The Tears Of A Clown’, where he repeats the attempt to convince his lost or would-be paramour that he may look as if he’s having a whale of a time but underneath he’s all sensitive and new-man and that, honest. It’s just a brave face. Yes, love, I may be out carousing with the lads, sinking 12 pints and bouncing off the walls, but really the old smile’s out of place. I’m sad. Sadder than sad.

And he pulls it off, no sweat. It’s odd to assess records that are established standards. There’s no question that Smokey’s tears melted the world’s heart, so I don’t need to dwell on how he did the trick, and the melody’s a winner because everyone knows it. It’s a simple rising scale with blaring brass to underline his bawls and – presumably – the seriousness of what he’s saying. Just look at his face.

But the ultimate test of a lyric’s success is its effect on a two-year-old. Look it up; it’s in the textbooks. Junior bounds around the room, twirling and skipping. It’s way off-tempo, off-message, off-putting. Robinson’s demeanour worked for her, and she won’t listen to any of his contradictions.

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[6] Sly & The Family Stone, ‘Everyday People’

May 13, 2008

And on the more circumspect side of the fence, funkmaster Sly and friends deliver the message with subtlety and oblique savvy. This isn’t just about colour – it’s rich man, poor man, fat man, thin man – but the context is irrelevant; everyone’s the same, and the word is all the more powerful for the freedom and joy the Family Stone put in to saying it. ‘Everyday People’ is swift, concise, blissful and propelled by the easiest horns this side of Al Green. When Arrested Development decided the track needed to be revisited in the ‘90s, they took the title line, flipped it, found ponderous beats and hectored us to within an inch of our patience. Sly knew that a bit of groove could sweeten any pill.

And it’s a groove to hook a little madam, who clapped along in time and, when the two minutes twenty-two seconds clipped by in a blink, announced “It’s gone”. And it is over all too soon, but it’s said as much as it’ll ever need to say.

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[7] Blue Mink, ‘Melting Pot’

May 7, 2008

Having praised Junior’s sense of rhythm recently, I might be forced into a rethink. She approached Blue Mink’s signature anthem for racial harmony with a selection of leaps that were way off tempo – but as the ‘Mink might say, it takes all sorts. In fact, a shout-out to berserk spacehopper kids would hardly sound out of place with the rest of the lyrics.

‘Melting Pot’ eases in with some churchy piano chords, setting the tone for a spiritual piece that would carry far greater weight if it wasn’t so terribly gauche. The “melting pot” is self-explanatory, but the recipe is pure 1969, pure pre-PC. “Curly black and kinky, mixed with yellow chinkies,” goes the jarring line. Ah. Well, there are better ways of putting it. Turning out “coffee-coloured people by the score” is a happy conclusion, but they – potentially – offend enough groups along the way.

We mustn’t be too harsh, because the sentiment is fair, and the song as a whole is a fine, post-Beatles-go-to-India, cod-religious rabble-rouser. The rag-bag session musos who made up Blue Mink attack it with a gusto that is infectious and life-affirming. It bowls along with a naïve charm, and maybe that’s what Junior was aiming for as well.

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[8] David Bowie, ‘Space Oddity’

May 1, 2008

Some records have been absolutely battered, but still sound fresh. I always think I’m tired of ‘Space Oddity’ and then I happen to play it again and enjoy it anew. We went for a “method” airing of this: played through the tinny laptop speaker as if it was being transmitted from a spaceship, dislocated, drifting, alone and doomed. Really, I couldn’t find a CD with it on, and have only just remembered that I have it on vinyl. No matter – the distorted, scratchy rendition was a winner.

Junior latched on to the lyric – “It’s like Tom!” – so far as the tragic hero shares a name with her uncle. He’s drifting in outer space too. Perth, to be precise. She then floated in orbit around the dining table and went on to protest wildly at having to put her shoes on.

As for me, yet again I enjoyed a subdued record that is nevertheless an epic. Perhaps I never play it loudly enough, but for all ‘Space Oddity’’s lush innovation and instrumental variety it still seems light of touch. It’s also bleak, poignant and immense. On reflection, I prefer Bowie garish.

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