CHICAGO - “If You Leave Me Now”

As I gradually learned more about music history it became apparent that there were a bunch of American bands who had enjoyed long careers in the 70s but who were close to invisible here. It seems to me that Britain has never really had an equivalent to the rock radio formats on which Chicago, among others, built a fanbase: individual DJs were left to promote adult-oriented and classic rock, which didn’t give dues-paying rock bands the space they had to build large audiences back home. Of course, I didn’t listen to radio in the 70s, so I’m happy to be corrected on this.Anyway the upshot is that the career of Chicago seemed (and seems) bizarre to me: literally dozens of albums, most of them doubles (or more!), reduced as far as I was concerned to a single soppy hit which I knew better from karaoke than from ever actually hearing the band’s version. And apparently “If You Leave Me Now” is hardly typical of the band’s work (to the extent that its success caused serious rifts). In Popular terms, though, it’s the first of a bunch of limpidly sincere records we’ll be meeting as the British public went ballad crazy. … read on …

PUSSYCAT - “Mississippi”

A few years ago, Channel 4 did a rundown of the Top 100 Best Selling Singles. My friends and I settled down to watch, cheer, shout at Kate Thornton, &c. And there, first up at No.100, was “Mississippi”, bringing a mighty collective WTF?? from everyone in the room - none of whom, I should add, were older than me. None of us had heard, or heard of, this song, which turned out to be the biggest-selling (in Britain) single to have made no mark whatsoever on pop history - at least as understood by us callow youngsters. To be honest we thought it might be a put-on. … read on …

Punk Metaphor Watch #1: Guess His Theory

With the biting winds of PUNK ROCK beginning to blow through the Popular comments boxes it’s time to examine the ways in which punk has become institutionalised as a metaphor - starting with Richard Williams on the Guardian football blog: Stadium Rock of Top Flight looks Bloated Against The Joy Division.

… read on …

Brandwatch: Marathon (and on and on)

Marathon is back! Back!! BACK!! : Mars have cashed in one of their longer-standing “free goodwill” chips by restoring - however briefly - 70s/80s icon Marathon to its brand portfolio (whether it’ll completely replace Snickers, and for how long, are unknowns).  The comments on this Brandrepublic story are withering - how unimaginative, the marketers scoff, how short-sighted.

AS IF! Not that I feel the re-re-brand is anything other than a deeply cynical move but it’s a well-timed one and likely to succeed in the short-term without damaging the brand in the long term. The cohort of consumers who identified with Marathon are now getting beyond the age where they buy countline confectionery - how better to get them to at least re-try the product? Nostalgia - especially for a cheaper age - works well in times of economic difficulty - and so does the parochialism which Mars is tapping into by jettisoning its ‘global’ Snickers brand. It’s a bit of free publicity in a sector where headline-making innovation is thin on the ground. And it’s sufficiently long after the Marathon brand was dropped originally for the move not to look like any kind of admission of error by Mars.

ABBA - “Dancing Queen”

In my teens I read a science fiction novel with a startlingly elegant twist. (I won’t mention the book’s name in case you come across it yourself.) It was about a brilliant scientist who vanishes: the book’s protagonist goes looking for clues to what happened, and becomes close to the scientist’s wife. And at a crucial juncture in the plot, the narration shifts, mid-paragraph, from third person to first: the scientist’s “vanishing” was literal, and with a thrill of horror you realise he’s been observing the action all along.

What on earth does this have to do with “Dancing Queen”? The song turns on a similar effect. Of all ABBA’s twenty or so hit singles this is the only one with no first-person content - none of the “I” or “me” or “us” that populate almost all their records. Of course on one level this is coincidence - but the apparent lack of personal perspective is very unusual for ABBA. They’re a band who like to ground their songs in experience and who pay close attention to a lyric’s perspective; even a character song like “Head Over Heels” makes sure to establish its subject’s relationship to the singer, right in the first line. “Dancing Queen” is entirely in the second-person - the song is directly addressed to a girl, but its narrator has, like the scientist in the novel, become invisible. … read on …

Europop 2008: Group A Finale

Switzerland take on Portugal and the Czechs battle Turkey in the last two Group A games. Click below the cut for managerial comment, analysis, match reports and previews.

How to vote: Pick the track you prefer from each pairing and vote - these polls close next Monday. You will need to click “submit” separately on each one. If you download the tracks please also vote! (We’re getting around twice as many downloads as votes currently).

 Loading …

 Loading …

… read on …

ELTON JOHN AND KIKI DEE - “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart”

The intro to this is a masterclass: the strings and piano curling around the bass and drums in what amounts to a trailer for the song, teasing its hooks for you. It’s a suitably flirty intro for a duet, so it’s a shame the performers don’t really catch fire. Or the performer - Kiki Dee doesn’t do much wrong (though it’s annoying how her lines sometimes just trail off), it’s just unfortunate that she’s partnered with the fearful pop heffalump that is Elton John. … read on …

Manga Review #2: Addicted To Curry

For my next go at manga I decided to try one that isn’t famous - Addicted To Curry in fact hasn’t been licensed for publication in English-speaking countries, so I was reliant on online “scanlations” - fan translations on scanned images. The amount of work and dedication that must go into producing these is phenomenal so thankyou O unknown copyright infringer!

I chose Addicted To Curry on title alone. Here is what it’s about: a schoolgirl has been left in charge of her father’s curry house, which is failing because she can’t cook. She saves a dying man in the street who turns out to be an amazing young chef and an old friend of her father’s. Together they work to make the curry house a success! Every episode features: … read on …

DEMIS ROUSSOS - The Roussos Phenomenon (EP)

(Special note: I have been unable to find a copy of all four tracks on the EP, so this review is written without having ever heard “So Dreamy”. So the mark out of ten is - unusually - subject to change. Though frankly I doubt it will.)

In a wayward year of odd Number Ones, this is one of the rummest. It isn’t the sort of thing I’d want to listen to very often, if at all, and if it was typical of the kind of records that top the charts, well, we wouldn’t be here. But there are enough intriguing touches on The Roussos Phenomenon to not dismiss it as wholly ridiculous. You are occasionally reminded that yes, this Demis Roussos is the same D.R. who released 666, a prog triple concept album about the Book of Revelation, the year before recording most of this…. slightly more accessible material. … read on …

Manga Review #1: Death Note

I decided last year it was time I read some manga, so I set myself a project: read 10 different ones - at least a “book” of each title. Manga have monstered the US comics market: they sell huge amounts, and they sell them to the people who used to buy American comics - kids and teens. I kicked off my project with the best-selling manga ever, Naruto, but I haven’t finished a whole book of that. Death Note, on the other hand, I wasn’t expecting to enjoy but I ran through a book in a train journey, and ended up sitting up until 2AM reading it on the web. Eventually I had to spoiler the ending in order not to stay up all night. This is significantly thrill-powered stuff.

The plot is pretty simple, though: a gifted high school student finds the Death Note, a notebook with the power to kill at a distance anyone whose real name the user writes in it. He starts using it to kill criminals, which attracts the attention of the police, who call in the world’s greatest detective, whose real name is - aha - unknown. Here’s why Death Note is good: … read on …