LIEUTENANT PIGEON - “Mouldy Old Dough”
(#321, 14th October 1972)
When I started Popular I wrote an introductory piece which nicked Raymond Williams’ ideas of emergent, dominant and residual trends, and argued that the charts were fascinating because they’re a quasi-artificial space in which all three can bump and boil. “Mouldy Old Dough” is residual in a cultural sense - it’s harking back to knees-up piano parties and the stomp and clap of pub music - but it also really sounds like residue. There’s something curdled about it, odd and off, like Winifred Atwell tunes left in the damp. This isn’t old music lovingly preserved and recreated, it’s old music stuffed in a boxroom or a cellar, left to rot and ferment until its queasy return. Its title is literal - the stuff of former pop gone bad.
So what was it doing at the top of the charts in 1972? I can make a guess as to the real reasons - the irresistible conceit of a mother and son band, the gleeful rhythmic attack and the way it plays off the plaintive woodwind melody, and of course that horrid arbitrary growl of a hook, the missing link between Steptoe and Johnny Rotten and just far enough back in the mix that it might be a tramp wandering into the recording studio (and the record being built around him, Gavin Bryars style!). There’s almost nothing like it, which can sometimes be a happy reason for a hit.
But novelty records are also when pop lets its guard down. The hits surrounding “Mouldy Old Dough” in the list of number ones might tell us something about how kids in the 70s - the ones who bought records at any rate - posed, loved, fought, crushed and dreamed. But this dredge through the silt and leaf litter of English pop seems to burrow into something broader and deeper: the decaying country itself, sinking into post-Imperial dementia, singing old songs to itself as the batteries run down and the lights go out.
That’s one story of 1970s Britain - shabby, backward-looking, falling to bits. It’s the version that post-Thatcher politicians have broadly endorsed, and not having been alive in 1972 it’s a version that’s coloured my impression of the period. From my childhood a few years later I remember - or I think I remember - that things were greyer and more ramshackle and washed-out then. For me “Mouldy Old Dough” is unshakeably evocative of this never-known time. 9
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Erithian on June 4th, 2007
Interesting points Tom – it’s always tantalising to think of the world just around the corner of your memory, the time immediately before you were born (which in my case is the pre-Merseybeat era). You’re right that the song harks back to a musty old age, in fact I understand the “mouldy old dough” line itself is an echo of an old music-hall chorus of “voe-dee-o-doe” probably sung through a megaphone. Again, though, you seem to be marking the record according to your theory of what it signifies rather than its intrinsic quality – but then, your gaff, your rules.
Even at the age where I was partial to a novelty hit or two, this one struck me as plain weird (although I did buy the sprightlier follow-up “Desperate Dan”). It’s hard to say what got it to number one, although the sight of Hilda Woodward at the old joanna no doubt helped! Still the only mother-son combination to have a number one single, although when I used it for a quiz a while back someone did come up with the alternative answer, Marge and Bart Simpson.
Fast forward 30-odd years to an office bowling night in South London where someone put an old classic on the jukebox. Our head of division listened to the rhythmic intro and commented “This is Mouldy Old Dough, isn’t it?” “Er, no, boss, it’s London Calling”, we replied. I’ll be generous and say there was a lot of background noise in the bowling alley, but maybe he’d unearthed a hitherto unsuspected influence on Strummer et al.
FT's Tom on June 4th, 2007
The mark is simply because I love the record - when I first played through the lists of No.1s I thought “That’s a 10″ and if anything I’ve overplayed it since and the mark’s come down. The review is partly an attempt to explain WHY I love the record, and partly a place to put some more general ideas about novelty.
The only record I know which has the same feel of cheery decay is Position Normal’s “Stop Your Nonsense” album, which I left at work when I moved jobs in 2000 - if any Popular readers could sort me out a new copy I would be utterly delighted. (Even then LP has a sad innocence PN lacks).
Obviously I’d like to hear more Lieutenant Pigeon too!
FT's Tom on June 4th, 2007
On the Strummer tangent, it’s interesting to me how the version of the 70s that’s become a standard part of the punk narrative is the same as the version that’s become part of the post-Thatcher political narrative. Was it really so horrible?
Marcello Carlin on June 4th, 2007
I’d say 1973-4 was the low point in terms of power cuts, oil shortages and three-day weeks (all engineered more or less deliberately, and we’re still reckoning with the ramifications today) but ‘72 certainly felt like the eve of horror with the genuine residue of Carr’s Industrial Relations Act, the post-Bloody Sunday bilateral tightening-in in Northern Ireland. No less a luminary than Noddy Holder has more than once been quoted as saying that glam may have acted as a sort of peacetime ENSA/ITMA equivalent; providing some cheer to the people in times of abject and otherwise unfaceable misery.
Then again Fletcher and Woodward Jr may simply have been looking to resuscitate Joe Meek, since they were both diehard fans of his; and “MOD” seems to me exactly the sort of thing Meek would have been doing had he lived.
The Pigeons - a.k.a. Stavely Makepeace, lest we forget, whose (generally) vocal records were scarcely less strange than the Pigeon ones and found very strong support on Noel Edmonds’ show - were not only archivists, though (remembering that both Winifred Atwell and Mrs Mills were still alive, well and working in 1972), but also entryists, aware that they were doing something different and maybe also subversive, even if (unlike their unlikely direct descendents the Rubettes and The KLF) they weren’t exactly sure what they were subverting or deconstructing. With their “Opus” series of B-sides in particular they journeyed to some extremely strange universes.
They do have a best-of CD available (as do Stavely Makepeace - both are highly recommended) and I note in their later career the slight (Coventry) overlap with Jerry Dammers and Neville Staples, which may in turn provide a direct leyline to “Ghost Town.”
For me, of course, a 10.
(I do still have my copy of the Position Normal CD but alas no CD burner until September gaah)
Erithian on June 4th, 2007
Apart from the thought that this is the period that brought down Heath rather than Callaghan, I don’t feel qualified to comment. I was growing up in a part of Manchester that was far from posh but not shabby, and I don’t at all remember the time as particularly horrible. Although the Q magazine 30-years-of-punk special last year had a feature on how the country has changed which was fairly convincing.
(For another unflattering portrait of 70s Britain, which came to mind reading the last para of your review, try the final chapter of Matthew Sweet’s “Shepperton Babylon”, which looks at the British sex comedy industry of that decade, and the striking fact that in 1976 “Adventures of a Taxi Driver”, starring Barry Evans, took more at the UK box office than “Taxi Driver”.)
The Pigeons’ last mini-hit was a version of “I’ll Take You Home Again Kathleen” which is as old as the hills. But the B-side of “Desperate Dan” is called “Opus 300” and defies description. Imagine one of Bjork’s more eccentric numbers punctuated with half a minute of “Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da”, and wonder what old Hilda made of it.
Erithian on June 4th, 2007
I’m thinking of ’72 there – as Marcello says, 73-74 was pretty grim for most of us.
Marcello Carlin on June 4th, 2007
As regards the history of “MOD,” it was originally released at the beginning of ‘72 to no reaction whatsoever, then after being used as the theme tune to a Belgian current affairs programme it went to number one there, prompting Decca to give it another go in Britain - and it worked (cf. “Baby Come Back”).
Alan Connor on June 4th, 2007
it’s interesting to me how the version of the 70s that’s become a standard part of the punk narrative is the same as the version that’s become part of the post-Thatcher political narrative.
Those dots are joined by Jonathan Coe in Rotters Club / Closed Circle: Paul Trotter becomes a prog-hating punk and dabbler with the far right in the 70s novel and becomes (IIRC) an unsympathetic New Labour type in the 90s one.
FT's wwolfe on June 4th, 2007
“But this dredge through the silt and leaf litter of English pop seems to burrow into something broader and deeper: the decaying country itself, sinking into post-Imperial dementia, singing old songs to itself as the batteries run down and the lights go out.”
I love that sentence. Thanks.
I’ve never heard, or heard of, this record. But I love the title and band name. They strike me as so perfectly English - almost rivaling what to me has always been the untoppably English “My Old Man’s a Dustman.” (The latter wins in part because I don’t know what a dustman is, thereby lending it an appealing sense of mystery).
I wonder if what does or doesn’t manage the leap from one country’s culture to another depends to some extent on whether the work in question is in harmony with the receiving country’s image of the sending country’s persona. As an American who remembers when Beatlemania struck, one aspect of the band’s success lay in a shared agreement among many Americans that, yes, *these* were the ideal Englishmen - the very idea of “English,” perfected.
I wonder as well if, by comparison, some cultural products that don’t make the leap, despite huge popularity at home, fail to do so because they *don’t* meet this test - despite, or perhaps because, the work is in truth as much, or even more, a true representative of its country’s personality: it’s so pure, it can’t translate.
Which I guess means that the Beatles managed for a surprisingly sustained time the near impossible feat of being simultaneously both perfectly English and as close to universal as we’ll ever see. No wonder they got tired.
Chris Brown on June 4th, 2007
I suppose you don’t want us to tell you what a dustman is then?
For some reason, we seem to be in a run of records I don’t have very strong or coherent ideas about, hence the shortage of comments here. Can I just say in general that I think there have been some excellent comments lately? Thanks.
Brian on June 4th, 2007
Argh - another song I don’t know ! But it’s a pleasure to read about it. Thank you Tom & WWolfe for great posts.
Brian on June 4th, 2007
A dustman is a garbage man.
Taken from UK term for garbage can is dust bin.
intothefireuk on June 4th, 2007
Almost impossible to peel away the thoughts of later years when MOD has somehow gained an air of respectability. Almost impossible, but I think I can still remember that it meant jack at the time. Flanked by Slade, Bolan, Glitter & Bowie et al, it was an aberration, a hand grenade thrown into the Glam party. On TOTP, the bizarre sight of the Mrs Mills type at the joanna plonking away, beaming smile and blue rinse was alarming to say the least. Maybe it did hark back to the pre-rock n roll era which would have made it all the more unwelcome considering the explosion of multi-coloured sequins & make up happening all around it. I couldn’t love it then but I can laugh at it now. No more than a 5 I’m afraid.
As a pre-teen growing up in the London suburbs I certainly wasn’t too aware of the political landscape, the only ‘dark days’ of the early 70s being those without electicity. Maybe I paid too much attention to TOTP and not enough to the news !
Doctor Casino on June 5th, 2007
I wonder as well if, by comparison, some cultural products that don’t make the leap, despite huge popularity at home, fail to do so because they *don’t* meet this test
This is a very interesting post, and offers in much better words a question I mused on many moons ago in one of these comment threads - maybe for “Lily The Pink”? What is the right balance between “charmingly English” and “too English”? Couldn’t say, but “Mouldy Old Dough” is okay by me. Definitely the weirdest number one we’ve seen in a while. Even Tom’s fairly convincing Anglopocalypse narrative above doesn’t seem enough to answer the question of “Where on Earth did this come from?” The growled title line isn’t quite soused and world-weary enough; you can tell he’s having a lot of fun doing this goofy song! It’s no “Winchester Cathedral” but it’s good. I can’t help connecting it back to “Son of My Father,” even if I can’t quite put my finger on why.
Marcello Carlin on June 5th, 2007
Actually it seemed to me like a perfectly logical appendix to glam (but then isn’t “Rock ‘N’ Roll Part 2″ the least logical of pop records?) - on TOTP, in addition to Hilda and her joanna, the drummer was dressed as Napoleon and Rob Woodward growled out “dirty old man” in lieu of the title. Sadly I couldn’t find the performance on YouTube but no doubt someone will post it.
Billy Smart on June 5th, 2007
It’s the curse of the BBC Archives once again. Only one of Lieutenant Pigeon’s many appearances survives - the one from the Christmas 1972 edition where they’re dressed in Robin Hood outfits. Which is pretty impressive in itself, but the idea that there were variant performances that I can never see is tantalising!
byebyepride on June 5th, 2007
Tom — I can sort you a copy of the Position Normal record. Will bring it down at the weekend! If I can work out how to transfer from vinyl to PC I can do you the second one as well. In fact I have half of it waiting to post on Sukrat…
FT's pˆnk s lord sükråt cunctør on June 5th, 2007
haha whenever someone says “the 70s was the worst time for strikes” i remember a gleeful riposte from nme’s sw3llsy (for it is he): “you mean the 70s was the BEST TIME for strikes”
in our family we loved the powercuts! big spooky dark cold house in the country, range in the kitchen, logfire in the sitting room, run between them to keep warm, stock up on candles night lights and paraffin heaters (i was clearing out dad’s house last year and finally chucked two of these out, with great sadness) (i think if i’d tried to light them one last time, the whole parish wd have died in a ball of flame) — instead of telly we played boardgames or consequences (which we thought the height of hilarious intelligent sophistication)
it was better than the blitz! (my mum — who was four when ww2 started — always maintained she enjoyed every second of it, so this is the kind of family you are up against)
Erithian on June 5th, 2007
wwolfe’s comment above reminds me of the discussion we were having about “Lily the Pink” and the Britmania that gripped the US in the mid-60s. In a sense “MOD” harks back to the Edwardian/WWI fad in the UK (“Kaiser Bill’s Batman,” “Winchester Cathedral”, even the Sgt Pepper costumes) and the time Herman’s Hermits could take a 1910 music hall song to No 1 in the States. Maybe if it had been out circa 1965, “MOD” could have been a “perfectly English” US smash!
Number 2 Watch – but for the Pigeon, 10cc could have kicked off their chart career with a Number 1 with “Donna”.
FT's Pete Baran on June 5th, 2007
Of course it was better than the blitz. People weren’t dying.
FT's Doctor Casino on June 5th, 2007
Dang it all, totally commented on this last night but it got lost in the ether somehow so I’ve been scooped on the “Lily The Pink” reference as well as “Winchester Cathedral.” Certainly I find Tom’s thesis here fairly convincing, although I’m not sure the song is quite dour enough to nail it on the head. The guy croaking out the title line is clearly enjoying himself doing the funny voice, and the overall impression is that “Son of My Father” has somehow run off the rails, gotten drunk, and kept swirling around in an increasingly disturbing, but still somehow joyous fashion. Lingering Sgt. Pepper-ism is afoot I daresay. This track is a fun discovery, just headsticky and weird enough where you could understand people really needing to hear it again, because your imagination can never quite recreate the exact tremble in that voice. As for the Anglopocalypse of the 70s, it’s funny - I’ve only ever absorbed a few scattered reference to this period (old Doonesbury strips, VH1 documentaries about Black Sabbath), and it was enough to convince me that it was never summer in England in the 70s. In America I picture people sweltering in the sun as they stand in gas lines; in England they shuffle through gray, gray, gray.
Mark M on June 5th, 2007
Well, except for the other thing everyone remembers about the 70s here is the extraordinary summer of 76, when it was sizzling hot from May 7 onwards and the classic English lawns burnt to a crisp and the pubs sold two million pints more than normal (or so it says in the A to Z of 76 I wrote for the Q 30 anniversary of Punk issue someone mentioned earlier…)
Mark M on June 5th, 2007
Measured look at the decade here , including comparison with the early 90s, whose grimness now seems largely forgotten in popular mythology…
Billy Smart on June 5th, 2007
One of the very greatest of number ones, for me a ten out of ten. The only thing I can add that nobody else has yet quite mentioned is the sheer lurchingness of the thing, the sense of imbalance but always managing to stay on its feet: it makes me feel rather drunk hearing it. Also, the connection that you make to Position Normal makes me think of other pieces in this context that I hadn’t thought of before - in the way that the same elements loop back again and again and recur; Revolution Number Nine or Reality Asylum.
Waldo on June 6th, 2007
“Mouldy Old Dough” is nothing if it isn’t a comedy record. I can remember the guy on the tin whistle, the old lag screaming out the title and the old bat on the old joanna, who was not the same person who recorded the piece back in the Decca studio. Complete rubbish but a lot of fun.
Mark Grout on June 7th, 2007
and the old bat on the old joanna, who was not the same person who recorded the piece back in the Decca studio.
oh really?
Also: The intro can easily be mistaken for Dylan’s “Rainy Day Women” but you knew that…
Waldo on June 7th, 2007
Really. There was a big hoo-hah about it and there were certainly a least a brace of old bats on the old joanna claining to be t’original old bat. They both/all were clearly the model for Viz’s “Mrs Brady Old Lady” so nobody could tell the difference nohow.
“Rainy Day Women” and “Mould Old Dough”… EVERYBODY’s gotta to get stoned!!!!!
Marcello Carlin on June 7th, 2007
Didn’t ver Pigeon record all their stuff in Hilda’s front room?
Waldo on June 7th, 2007
I don’t know about that, Marcello. All I can say is that the BBC early evening magazine programme “Nationwide” (it launched Sue “So Lonely” Lawley) really got their teeth into the Lieutenant Pigeon “scandal” and I can recall old ladies popping up all over the place. It sure as well wasn’t Billy Preston!
Marcello Carlin on June 7th, 2007
Did Richard Stilgoe write a wry satirical verse on the scandal in his Thursday consumer spot?
Waldo on June 8th, 2007
I would say that that was spot-on. Sounds like Stilgoe all over. Puerility was all.
Rosie on June 18th, 2007
And off to Uni we go. For me this track has the whiff of spilled bad beer and dodgy pies in the Sphinx Bar of Liverpool Students Union - it was a fixture on the jukebox there.
As for the early seventies - it’s not a time I remember as being particularly grey. I think the greyness of the time was a myth really - surely it was less grey than the austere fifties for those old enough top have lived through them. The pubs were certainly better then - I have very fond memories of the early weeks of 1972, with the miners’ strike and the power cuts in action, and spending candlelit evenings in the Waggoners pub at Ayot Green. In the early weeks of 1972 the Waggoners was still on the A1, on a bend of what was then still a single carriageway road, so that made coming and going in the pitch dark an interesting experience…
FT's Tom on June 18th, 2007
Hullo Rosie - good to have you back!
FT's pigwell on June 23rd, 2007
err, I only came across your site because I was looking for cover versions of this (my favourite ever) song
the whole of ‘72 sounds like residue, ‘72 is when our world began - the modern world started in 48, and was mainstream in the sixties, and then was gone - so much of the music of ‘72 is inspired by the recognition that progress has ended even as change continues - no longer able to claim legitimacy by referring to the future, it dishonestly claims it by evoking the past
Glitter/Leander’s referencing of Rock’n'Roll (in ‘72) is the pivotal text here - the song sounds nothing like rock’n'roll even as it claims to be rock’n'roll - and there were many imitators, some of whom did sound like rock’n'roll
the best illustration of the end of history in ‘72 has to be that in 1969, 1969 was hot enough for the Stooges to release “1969″; by ‘74 Sweet’s “Sixteens” refers back to ‘69 as a lost past - and we think the cycle of fashion is rapid now
five years, five years, eh
Marcello Carlin on June 24th, 2007
define the “our” in “our world” plz.
Lena on June 25th, 2007
Um, didn’t the ‘modern world’ start in 1977 like The Jam said?
FT's doofuus2003 on July 3rd, 2007
Tom, I was alive and 17 when this was a hit, and to me it was (at the time & now) a complete irrelevance. I said something much the same in comments on Son of my father, and as with that one, to see such revisionism of their reputations 35 years later is a puzzle.
On whether the early ’70s were gray, I think it depends on what your age was/what you were doing then; I had known no other time, and as a late teenager, leaving school and going to university, getting my first car (Triumph Herald, 40 quid) it seemed pretty good to me…
Marcello Carlin on July 3rd, 2007
Results 1 - 10 of about 1,140 for “other people having different opinions”. (0.38 seconds)
Billy Smart on September 2nd, 2007
In today’s Observer, we learn that Mouldy Old Dough was the tune to which Joe Royle’s Oldham Athletic FC ran out onto the pitch of Boundary Park in the late 80s and early 90’s. The practice stopped when they were promoted to the top division in 1991 - when the strident sound of ELP’s Fanfare for the Common Man was considered more appropriate.