no need to look no more because I've opened up my door....

Earworms of the Week

Paul McCartney - "Pipes of Peace"

Yes.  They've started playing Christmas music in the reception to my office.  It's barely November.  I know that, as a retailer, we really would be happy for it to be Christmas every day... but really I don't think there's any need for this so soon, is there?  The irony is that I'm actually very partial to a bit of Christmas music.  It's just that there is so much good festive music out there and we always end up listening to the same 10-20 songs every damn year.  Seriously.  Look harder.  Even if these songs were ever good once - and that's by no means true of all of them - they have basically been ruined by over-exposure.  Mind you, it won't be long before I'm digging out the best Christmas song ever recorded.... Sandy Claw.

Ra Ra Riot - "Can You Tell"

This popped up on my playlist when I was out running the other night.  I think this might just be the perfect song.  It NaNoWriMo time of the year - speaking of which, I'd better get started - and therefore highly appropriate as I first became aware of this when Mandy sent me a CD that she'd put together to accompany her nano novel from a few years ago.  I love this song, Mandy!  Now, was it 50,000 words I need to write?  I've forgotten how it works....

Harry Belafonte - "Zombie Jamboree"

Seasonally appropriate and, frankly, just an excellent song.  I'm going through a bit of a Belafonte phase at the moment.  I love the Calypso.

The Clash - "Know Your Rights"

Know your rights all 3 of them
I say
Number 1: You have the right not to be killed
Murder is a CRIME!
Unless it was done by a
Policeman or aristocrat
Number 2: You have the right to food money
Providing of course you
Don't mind a little
Humiliation, investigation
And if you cross your fingers
Rehabilitation
Wang! Young offenders! Know your rights
Number 3: You have the right to freeeee
Speech as long as you're not
Dumb enough to actually try it.....

amen Joe.

Hank Williams - "I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry"

I don't actually own any Hank Williams, but I'm becoming strangely obsessed with that whole sad cowboy thing he had going on.  Maybe I've been watching too many films set in the deep south? 1949 and it still sounds magnificent.

Velvet Underground - "Sweet Jane"
John Cale - "Paris 1919"

The first is an old favourite, of course, ("just watch me now!") but I caught a bit of John Cale being interviewed on the radio the other day and it got me thinking about his solo stuff.  I was reminded how I randomly bought a live album of his in my first year at University and that actually he's done some great songs... not all of them written by him, of course, as his arrangement of Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah" has very much become the standard that was followed by the likes of Jeff Buckley et al.  I love the little trilling chorus of this one.  Now that I think about it, I really must dig out that album again.  (and just listening to his version of "Hallelujah" as I dug out that link has made me realise all over again what a great version of a magnificent song that is.  It's a cold and broken hallelujah.  Beautiful song.  I've got goosebumps)

Them Crooked Vultures - "Mind Eraser, No Chaser"

You would think that it's hard to go wrong with a group made up of Dave Grohl, Josh Homme and John Paul Jones, but this album isn't 100% successful for me.  It just seems less than the sum of its parts somehow.  Mind you, that said, I have absolutely no complaints about this record whatsoever.

Maximo Park - "Girls Who Play Guitars"

Specifically the opening guitar chords.  I actually had to sing it down to some lyrics to work out what it was.  Good album, this.

R.Kelly - "Bump n'Grind"

My mind's telling me no.....
But my body, my body's telling me yes....

This just popped into my head in the car on the way home from work the other day... I think we were in a queue of traffic (month 1 of a planned 24 of chaos on the roads for the second phase of the tram... thanks Nottingham City Council!) and a guy pulled up alongside us in a white car with the window open just enough for everyone to hear the shitty R&B that he was pumping out for us.  Needless to say, I found this so funny that I burst into a spontaneous version of this song.... much to the amusement of Keith and my wife who were also in the car.  Amazingly, both of them thought that I had made this up on the spot. I told them that, if they liked this one, then they should wait for my next single,  "I Believe I Can Fly" as that one will be massive.....

OK.  Done.  Have a good weekend, y'all....