DANA - “All Kinds Of Everything”
(#284, 18th April 1970)
It was pointed out to me in the pub last week that this record is actually the best of Ireland’s Eurovision winners, a claim with horrible implications that may sadly be correct. It also shows off two of the Song Contest’s typical idiosyncrasies. Firstly, a tendency to reward attempts at universal messages, expressed as simply as possible (and in this case as tweely as possible). This tendency has actually been almost wiped out since the Contest’s marketers started emphasising the kitsch aspects and actually courting their gay audience - the shift from Dana to Dana International. Or it may be that the European public’s taste for nursery-rhyme pop has collapsed: no bad thing if so.
The second oddness about the Song Contest is that the strength or even competence of a singer’s voice is rarely an issue. This sets it against the 00s wave of TV talent shows, which tend to focus on singing but apply a very narrow definition of what a ‘good’ voice is (one totally unrelated to my pragmatic definition: ’suits the song’). In Eurovision a technically weak voice can win easily given a performance with character and a strong song, and this allows for some endearing and exciting victories. Dana isn’t one of them: her strained warble (“a snowflake or twooooo”) may suit the extreme limpness of her song but it’s painful to hear. 2
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FT's Doctor Mod on September 30th, 2006
Seems Dana has had some interesting subsequent careers in Irish politics and US religious television broadcasting.
Fortunately, we were spared this song on west side of the Atlantic.
FT's pˆnk s lord sükråt cunctør on September 30th, 2006
i am fairly sure that the jury voting — certainly in 1970 and up to a surprisingly late stage — was explicitly based on study of the SHEET MUSIC and NOT the performance, live or recorded
(voting was also restricted to a hidden panel of pop iundustiry worthies from each nation rather than the local general public) (ie like x-factor except in hermetic conclave)
markgamon on September 30th, 2006
Two points? There you go, coming over all generous again…
markgamon on September 30th, 2006
I’m also a little troubled that you actually HAD A CONVERSATION IN THE PUB about this record…
FT's rosie on September 30th, 2006
2? Aren’t you being a bit generous to this irritiating streak of saccharine dribble, Tom?
It’s the sort of tune that belongs on a Victorian musical box, and a voice that belongs in the infants’ school Christmas concert.
For my money, the worst so far! (Though there is worse to come)
FT's Tom on September 30th, 2006
I don’t mind the arrangement, I suppose! It was nearly a 1, but it doesn’t actually anger me like some records do.
Mark: the pub talk was “what’s coming up on Popular?” “Dana” “Oh dear.”!
Alan Connor on September 30th, 2006
I can’t think of this having reappeared in any ads or movies, though I kind of want to remember some allusion to it in the Eurovision episode of Father Ted.
Sinéad O’Connor and Terry Hall duetted it, and Foster & Allen couldn’t leave it alone. But surely there’s been some kind of credible / curio / ironic Eurovision covers album?
FT's pˆnk s lord sükråt cunctør on September 30th, 2006
we surely discuss more troubling topics than poor old dana on a WEEKLY BASIS?!
FT's Tom on September 30th, 2006
The Eurovision Ted episode was on the back of Ireland’s three back to back winners in the mid 90s (all ABSOLUTELY AWFUL including “Rock And Roll Kids” which is the worst Eurovision winner ever and quite probably one of the worst songs ever recorded). Dana probably seemed like a fond memory at this point.
(Is Ireland the worst country in Europe (possibly the world) at pop music? I think I have advanced this argument before when drunk.)
FT's Doctor Mod on September 30th, 2006
No, I think that Ireland has caught up with the rest of the world in many ways, particularly in the last decade or two. Surely some credible pop has come out of Eire since the 1980s. Before that? Probably not, even though an incredible number of UK pop stars are only a generation or two removed from the Emerald Isle.
markgamon on September 30th, 2006
Tom - I forgive you. But you can understand why I was worried!
Chris Brown on September 30th, 2006
Sorry, the quote didn’t come through:
“On the Eurotrash programme Terry was shown claiming that if the lyrics to ‘All Kinds of Everything’ were copyrighted Leonard Cohen they would be seen as a work of genius, as opposed to being denigrated and overlooked due to the Eurovision connection.”
FT's Tom on September 30th, 2006
One of the half-endearing half-annoying things about Terry Wogan’s grip on Eurovision is the fact that he is seemingly the worst judge in the entire country of a) what’s good and b) what will win. “Now, people have been talking this one up, and I have to say I think it’s in with a shout” he will say before some shocking Maltese ballad that clocks up 14 points total.
Ophir Zemer on September 30th, 2006
Surprisingly enough, this song does appear at least in one movie - albeit an Israeli one: it’s short from the creators of “Walk on Water”, where it is IIRC one character’s favourite song of all time! (I don’t think the song was ever a hit here BTW. But Johnny Logan used to be very popular in the 80’s…)
FT's Andrew Farrell on September 30th, 2006
You talk as if second-guessing the Eurovision can be in any way accomplished by mortal men, Tom!
wwolfe on October 1st, 2006
“Sea gulls and aeroplanes/Things of the sky…”
That’s an awful line - “Things of the sky”?? Why not just say, “I can’t think of anything else that flies to put here”? Chuck Berry could have saved lots of effort by just writing, “Things about cars” for a lots of his lyrics.
iTunes only has Foster and Allen’s version. If Dana’s is even more twee, it’s scary.
This reminds me of Tom T. Hall’s “I Love” from a few years later: a laubdry list of things that make the singer sentimental, and then he gets sentimental about getting sentimental. Still, this doesn’t make me fill with rage at its badness. It’s mostly just a shock to consider this sitting alongside “Thank You (Falletinme Be Mice Elf Agin)” in that big aeroplane - a thing of the sky - maked “1970.”
And earlier this week I said I was going to honor Ask a Stupid Question Day” (today) by asking a stupid question aboiut “Lily the Pink.” So: What does the title mean? What I mean is, are the three words supposed to be Noun/Article/Adjective, or Verb/Article/Noun? In other words, “Ivan the Terrible” or “Do the Strand”? It’s probably the former, but it could also be some English slang expression I don’t know.
So there’s my Stupid Question. My only defense is - it’s not as stupid as “Things of the sky” was as a lyric.
FT's Doctor Mod on October 1st, 2006
I caught a snippet of the Dana original on allmusic.com. A snippet was enough. Prepare to be scared, wwolfe. Yes, even more twee. Even Sinead O’Connor (in her version with Terry Hall) can’t save it from its inherent tweeness. And Dana is very, very twee, with that clockwork sort of arrangement that must have been a prerequisite for Eurovision (cf. “Puppet on a String” and “Boom Bang-a-Bang”).
It’s mostly just a shock to consider this sitting alongside “Thank You (Falletinme Be Mice Elf Agin)” in that big aeroplane - a thing of the sky - maked “1970.”
Thank you–the visual image is stunning. One hopes the volume is so loud that “things of the ground” can hear Sly and the Family Stone as the aeroplane flies overhead. “Things of” seems to be part of the metaphorical structure upon which the whole song, um, sits or stands. The snippet I heard had something about the “snowflake or twooo-oooo” and “Dances, romances / Things of the night.” Personally, I can think of a lot of “things of the night” that would come to mind before dances and romances, but then I’ve been cynical from a very young age.
I think we’re coming up on an era of metaphor abuse. We’ve already had that “Silver Girl,” which is absurd but not quite as flat-footed as “things of the sky,” which suggests an inability to think what all that might entail (bats, zeppelins, locusts, bombs, meteorites, UFOs, or, in the next song, a great big spirit). You could substitute any of these things for the original lyric; they might make the imagery more perverse, but the result wouldn’t be all that different. But then the title in itself suggests a grab bag of ill-sorted objects in which all seem to have equal value. Anything will do.
Chuck Berry could have saved lots of effort by just writing, “Things about cars” for a lots of his lyrics.
“As I was motivatin’ over the hill / I saw things about cars . . . .” Indeed!
FT's pˆnk s lord sükråt cunctør on October 1st, 2006
oh we-e-e’ll link we’ll link we’ll link to lily the pink the pink the pink
(i put this link up last time as well wwolfe! do pay attention!)
it’s a nonsense song about a once well-known article which featured someone’s name on the bottle — given that the name was euphonious, people understandably made up stories about the person whose name it was, and a song as well
FT's pˆnk s lord sükråt cunctør on October 1st, 2006
(maybe “lily the pink” comes from people mishearing “lyd-i-a pink(ham)” when sung — though it may also be from some dialect way of generating nicknames; i wz gunna say liverpool dialect but tho the scaffold are from liverpool, i don’t think the song is)
Chris Brown on October 1st, 2006
Just to clarify my earlier post there; it’s Terry *Hall* invoking Leonard Cohen, rather than Terry Wogan. I presume he was still in Ireland back then anyway.
There used to be a comedy show over on Radio 4 called “Look Back At The Nineties” which once did a spoof Irish Eurovision entry that consisted entirely of insults to other European nations. Over in the real world, the Irish solved the problem by sending a singer over to Norway on a scholarship so she won for them instead.
Hmm… three posts from me in this thread and nothing about the song? Draw your own conclusions.
Daniel_Rf on October 1st, 2006
“All Kinds Of Everything” appears in “High Fidelity”; there’s this crazy bum who asks the main character if the store has it everyday, then starts singing the song until he gets chased out again iirc. This being the only mention I’ve heard of the tune in my life, I thought Tom was going to do the proper poptimist thing and explain why it is actually brilliant and Hornsby is WRONG as per usual - but then Hornsby doesn’t make all that much of a case for it being a bad song either, so I guess this is not all that U&K.
FT's koganbot on October 1st, 2006
Gak! Where is Bjork when we need her. (I’d previously had little use for Bjork, but she’s the only person I can think of who could rescue this song.)
FT's koganbot on October 1st, 2006
Sail on silver spirit thing in the sky.
Marcello Carlin on October 2nd, 2006
Of course the Irish entry won in 1970 for reasons not entirely musical (cf. Nicole)…
Erithian on October 2nd, 2006
The Eurovision episode of Father Ted was sheer genius.
Dana had a run of UK hits in the mid-70s, one of which was accompanied by a rather fetching head-and-shoulders publicity photo which gave no hint of the strapless dress she was presumably wearing. The Record Mirror headline “Was Dana topless? - the truth” is one of the more surreal memories of the time.
FT's Doctor Mod on October 2nd, 2006
And to think she could have been President of Ireland…..
FT's wwolfe on October 2nd, 2006
Thank you, p^nk lord. I love that kind of social history.
FT's Doctor Mod on October 3rd, 2006
I just wish I could make this stupid song–which I’d never heard before Saturday–stop playing over and over in my head!
My name is Kenny on October 5th, 2006
How is this any worse than “Those Were the Days”?
Heinz on March 13th, 2007
All Kinds Of Everything is super Hit, Grand Compliment on Dana!
Kieran on March 15th, 2007
….at least Dana has got you all takin…I enjoyed her singing and her music, give the girl a break, she did Irleand proud and she’s still going, raised a family and still proud to be Irish.
Good on ye girl
gerry brown on June 2nd, 2007
i find that apart from heinz and kieran,the rest of you would,nt know a nice person if you fell over one,you would have no time for dana because shes not a piss head or a smack head,she has a faith that she believes in ,while the only faith you lot have is none,but while your there talking shit you can rest asure that dana has made more money from that little annoying song that you shit heads will ever seein your lifetime,
Caledonianne on July 15th, 2007
Mince and potatoes
Curry and rice
Always it’s awful
Never it’s nice
Soggy cake
Half-baked
Custard too thick
When I am fi-i-nished
I want to be sick.
Am I the only one one who sang this little pastiche re school dinners about a month after the Eurovision conquest?
FT's Tom on July 16th, 2007
EXCELLENT.