A nation turns its lonely eyes to you.

Download: We’ll Be Together – Gordon Banks & Friends (mp3)

It was easy to knock Gary Numan (he ripped off David Bowie, voted Conservative, and stared meaningfully at little pyramids on his album sleeves) and knock him I did. I used to have a Saturday job in the record department of a WH Smith’s in the late 70s/early 80s when Numan was the biggest thing since sliced bread. One day these two teenage girls came in dressed up in full Numanoid regalia — black military jackets, black eyeliner etc. — and bought one of his records. While serving them I gave a condescending little smile and told them how Numan was just a Bowie rip-off and if they only heard “Low” and “Diamond Dogs” they’d realize where he got his whole act from and see the error of their ways. Even though it was only a WH Smith* and I was wearing a brown blazer I was still the sort of insufferably smug twat you can get in real record shops. Not surprisingly they ignored me, all they did was come in to buy a record and they got a lecture from the four-eyed wanker behind the counter (did I mention I was wearing a brown blazer?)

What I didn’t tell those young ladies was that I owned a copy of the Tubeway Army single “Down In The Park” and loved it (still do.) This came out before “Are ‘Friends’ Electric?” made him a star which could be another reason why my snobby 17-year-old self thought it was OK, it was never tainted by the charts (or young girls buying it in WH Smith’s). Thankfully I grew out of that attitude long ago.

Download: Down In The Park – Tubeway Army (mp3)
Buy: “Replicas” (album)

*I say only a WH Smith’s but the staff were mostly young music nuts like myself and we were often the only place on Putney High Street that had things like the new Jam single in picture sleeve (most important) so we used to get a lot of Mods and Punks coming in. I first heard “Unknown Pleasures” while working there too.

I’m surprised it’s taken me so long to get to Frank Sinatra when delving into my mother’s record collection. Talking about her taste in music and leaving out Ol’ Blue Eyes is like a history of art that doesn’t mention Michelangelo. He was the untouchable King as far as my parents were concerned (“Come Fly With Me” was played at my Dad’s funeral, that song won’t sound the same ever again) and my sister and I were indoctrinated at an early age with a love of all things Frank. I probably knew all the words to “I’ve Got You Under My Skin” when I was still in nappies and just seeing the sleeve of “Songs For Swingin’ Lovers” sends me on a Proustian rush into the past.

Sinatra was something of an anachronism by the late 1960s, a hero to the older “square” generation who spent most of the decade trying to stay relevant which led to horrors like his cover of “Mrs. Robinson” (count yourself lucky if you haven’t heard that.) But one very smart move he made in 1967 was to jump on the bandwagon for all things Brazilian and Bossa and make an album with Antonio Carlos Jobim. The combo of Sinatra’s elegant phrasing with Jobim’s gentle, sun-kissed songs resulted in what I think is the coolest record ever made (in the truest sense of the word), immaculate and poised right down to it’s cufflinks. The greatest thing about Sinatra’s singing was how he never rushed a song, even uptempo ones. Try and sing along to one of his records and you’ll soon find yourself overtaking him as he hangs back, savouring every syllable of the lyrics. With Jobim he slows down to a mellow and languid crawl, his voice barely above a whisper. But I can’t describe the record any better than how the sleeve notes did:

“It had begun like the World Soft Championships. The songs, mostly by Antonio Carlos Jobim. Tender melodies. Tender like a two-day, lobster-red Rio sunburn, so tender they’d scream agony if handled rough. Slap one of his fragile songs on the back with a couple of trumpets? Like washing crystal in a cement mixer.
Seemed like the whole idea was to out-hush each other. Decibels treated like daggers. The arranger tiptoeing about, eliminating some percussion here, ticks there, ridding every song of clicks, bings, bips, all things sharp. Doing it with fervor matched by Her Majesty’s Silkworms.”

As I’ve mentioned before my mother was a big fan of all the Latin-flavoured adult pop around at the time so Sinatra making a record with Jobim was a match made in heaven for her and this got heavy play on our old mono Bush record player. Aside from lovely Jobim tunes like “How Insensitive” the album has a few Bossa-fied versions of old standards like Cole Porter’s “I Concentrate On You” which drips with the sleek ambience of a jet set lounge. When those flutes play you can almost hear the lights dimming and the clink of ice cubes dropping into heavy glasses of Jack Daniel’s.

Download: How Insensitive – Frank Sinatra & Antonio Carlos Jobim (mp3)
Download: I Concentrate On You – Frank Sinatra & Antonio Carlos Jobim (mp3)
Buy: “Francis Albert Sinatra & Antonio Carlos Jobim” (album)

Bonus feature: This clip of Sinatra singing “The Girl From Ipanema” with Jobim is just too wonderful for words. Watch and learn kids, this is what cool really looks like.

This photo of a fabric shop on Petticoat Lane is from the wonderful book “Shutting Up Shop” by photographer John Londei which is a beautiful but very sad time capsule of the traditional small British shop. Sadly these little oasis of local, individual English character are vanishing and being replaced by chains and megastores.

There was a Chemist shop just like this round the corner from us when I was a kid with wooden shelves and glass cabinets laden with rows of powders, potions, syrups in heavy brown bottles, and Lucozade wrapped in orange cellophane. Apart from the chemist we had a butcher, a greengrocer, a proper old sweet shop, a haberdasher, a grocer, and even a cobbler. They’re all closed now and my mum does her shopping at a big Waitrose. Peter’s Fish and Chips was still there last time I looked though, going strong (I hope) after what must be more than 30 years in business.

I wrote about shops like this in the very first post on this blog and much as I try to avoid going the old fogey, “things were better in my day, lad” route sometimes I can’t help it (anyway, they were better).

Not an entirely relevant song, but close enough.

Download: Portobello Road – Cat Stevens (mp3)
More photos here.

“Boy, it began to rain like a bastard. In buckets, I swear to God. All the parents and mothers and everybody went over and stood right under the roof of the carousel, so they wouldn’t get soaked to the skin or anything, but I stuck around on the bench for quite a while. I got pretty soaking wet, especially my neck and my pants. My hunting hat really gave me quite a lot of protection, in a way, but I got soaked anyway. I didn’t care though. I felt so damn happy all of a sudden, the way old Phoebe kept going round and round. I was damn near bawling, I felt so damn happy, if you want to know the truth. I don’t know why. It was just that she looked so damn nice, the way she kept going round and round, in her blue coat and all. God, I wish you could’ve been there.”
J. D. Salinger
The Catcher In The Rye (1951)

I don’t remember how old I was when I first read “The Catcher In The Rye” (I still have my old Penguin Modern Classics copy which cost 30p) but I was the type who identified with Holden Caulfield and still am in a lot of ways. Holden was a clever, sarcastic kid who wasn’t very good at games and was prematurely cynical about the world but had a sentimental streak a mile wide. He was a teen rebel but not in any wild, Jack Kerouac, James Dean, living-on-the-edge, rock and roll sort of way. He loved childish innocence and just wanted adults to be honest and nice which makes him more of an indie-pop sort of rebel, the patron saint of quiet boys who start fanzines in their bedrooms, make mixtapes for pretty girls, or form cute indie bands. Orange Juice made his influence apparent when they put out records on a label called “Holden Caulfield Universal” but if they were to make a movie of the novel I’d nominate The Pale Fountains to supply the soundtrack. Edwyn Collins had Holden’s sardonic humour but Fountains’ lead singer Michael Head captured his wistful yearning and fragile sensibility.

Download: Just A Girl – The Pale Fountains (mp3)

In my movie version of “Catcher In The Rye” I can imagine The Fountains’ lovely second single “Thank You” bursting out like fireworks over the climactic scene with Holden’s little sister spinning around on the carousel while he breaks down in tears at the transcendent beauty of it all. With it’s soaring crescendos of strings there wouldn’t be a dry eye in the house.

Download: Thank You – The Pale Fountains (mp3)

By the time their debut album “Pacific Street” finally emerged in 1984 they had competition from new bands like the even more bookish and precious Prefab Sprout (who wrote songs based on Graham Greene novels). Flop though it was, the album did produce their best ever moment in the majestic single “(Don’t Let Your Love) Start A War” (which was called “You’ll Start A War” on the album). This is the extended 12″ version which is even more epic and not available on CD anywhere far as I know.

Download: (Don’t Let Your Love) Start A War (12″ version) – The Pale Fountains (mp3)

Bonus feature: I saw The Fountains live supporting Orange Juice (God, I wish you could’ve been there) when their second album “From Across the Kitchen Table” came out. As you can see from this video for the single “Jean’s Not Happening” by then the group were into leather jackets, ripped jeans, and motorbikes, but even with loud guitars they still sounded like nice boys.

Be careful out there, kids.