Apologies to anyone who wanted to, you know WRITE, about this subject. We couldn’t find anyone on the internet who was interested. In fact, for the life of us we’re not even sure how this entry managed to get this high in the list. We suspect an orchestrated internets campaign on USENET.
What’s the deal with Belle and Sebastian? Loads of people idolise them, perhaps as many despise them. I’ve always just heard pleasant but inessential indie-pop with catchy-ish tunes and fairly lame vocals (though I get that it’s kind of the point), sometimes merry, sometimes wistful but never, to these ears, exciting. “Like The Beatles if they’d all been Paul” is how I once, snidely, dismissed them. This isn’t a ‘why bother with wimpy indie-pop’, I get why people dig that, but why their wimpy indie-pop over anyone else’s?
#2: My head's to the wall and I'm lonely 1 Sep 2020 A bracket dominated by indiepop - some established at this point, some emergent, some doing things a little differently. There was a lot of this stuff about in 2001; it…
STEPS - "Heartbeat" / "Tragedy" 30 Aug 2014 This is the first Popular entry I’ve written in the Southern hemisphere. And while it wasn’t a big hit down under – or, I think, anywhere except the UK –…
Canoe: Dig It? 3 Dec 2017 La Belle Sauvage by Philip Pullman Philip Pullman has an enviable knack of getting critics to dwell on the high-flown literary allusions in his books - Paradise Lost in the…
ROBBIE WILLIAMS - "Eternity" / "The Road To Mandalay" 24 Jan 2016 The album cycle that began with “Rock DJ” a year before staggers to its end four singles later with “The Road To Mandalay”, a bitter squib of a song, pulled…
The Freaky Trigger Readers’ Poll 2016 15 Dec 2016 "Hello readers! It's me, last year's winner, Missy Elliott! Although 2016 has been an eventful year, I definitely hadn't forgotten about my triumphant song at all. Definitely not. And neither…
The Freaky Trigger Readers' Poll 2017: #20-#11 18 Jan 2018 "Hi there, I'm the Heart of the Ocean, a fictional diamond necklace made famous by Britney asking whether I'd been chucked in the Atlantic Ocean or not when actually I…
Manage A Team In The Pop World Cup 2018! 1 Dec 2017 Bozhe moi! IT'S BACK! The draw for the Football World Cup was made today, and so, for the fourth time, we're delighted to host the POP WORLD CUP. The point…
17 Jun 2018
It’s here! The opening game of the Pop World Cup finds the four teams of Group A raising the curtain on the tournament. Pop football veterans Russia and Uruguay meet two Arab states – Egypt and Saudi Arabia – with less of a record at this level. Who will prevail? You decide. Spotify playlist and […]
8 May 2018
Eight episodes are now up: Hazel Southwell and Mark Sinker talking through the story of the UK music press from two very different angles (bcz I am old and she is not), to help start the conversation around my upcoming book. pod 1: the pilot! pod 2: uh merry memories of the nme! pod 3: […]
9 Jul 2002
Andrew WK: I Get Wet: Pitchfork Review: Remarkable write-up of the Andrew WK album from Ryan Schrieber, Pitchforkmedia’s editor-in-chief. Remarkable because it gets Andrew WK’s music so descriptively right – “Nothing could penetrate a sound that dense. I was overcome. I tried to remember the last time anyone dared to push rock so poppily over […]
2 May 2008
#389, 2nd June 1976 I was aware of this song long before I heard it – as a young boy it was quoted at me by my Dad should I ever object to tidying my room. Since my room was rarely tidy, I became very familiar with the central notion of “No Charge”. Like my Dad, I […]
15 Dec 2009
One of the things that’s fascinating about the UK Top 40 is that a device designed to be a pure expression of popularity also works as a reflection of so many other things. People buy songs: if enough people buy a song it gets into the charts, or to #1. Simple! But so simple that […]
9 Jan 2004
Independence Day. Isn’t it marvellous? Hurrah hurrah let’s kill the stripper and those hippies! That’s the kind of morals I WANT from my films! Until the aliens bugger up by deciding just to kill EVERYBODY. Where’s the subtlety, the art, the je ne sais quoi indeed about that? Who cares when we have plucky heroes […]
3 Apr 2017
So for a while myself and Pamela Hutchinson, of Silent London fame have been talking about doing a more regular podcast. And while we love talking about silent films, we also like new films too. And so The Sound Barrier was born over a Campari Spritz or four, we take a new release and we […]
15 Sep 2013
Ten years ago tomorrow, I started writing a review of Al Martino’s “Here In My Heart”. I’d never heard the first UK Number One, and thanks to P2P networks I had the chance. Somewhere between starting the blog entry and finishing it, I thought of reviewing all of them. I had no idea how long […]
Best post ever.
Apologies to anyone who wanted to, you know WRITE, about this subject. We couldn’t find anyone on the internet who was interested. In fact, for the life of us we’re not even sure how this entry managed to get this high in the list. We suspect an orchestrated internets campaign on USENET.
This song is great, I’m sure I voted for it. I last heard it playing in Starbucks and they cut the song just before the word “wanks”.
Presumably they don’t know what an arab strap is otherwise they’d forego the whole song. FWIW this is my favourite Belle & Sebastian song.
No, Punka was robbed.
What’s the deal with Belle and Sebastian? Loads of people idolise them, perhaps as many despise them. I’ve always just heard pleasant but inessential indie-pop with catchy-ish tunes and fairly lame vocals (though I get that it’s kind of the point), sometimes merry, sometimes wistful but never, to these ears, exciting. “Like The Beatles if they’d all been Paul” is how I once, snidely, dismissed them. This isn’t a ‘why bother with wimpy indie-pop’, I get why people dig that, but why their wimpy indie-pop over anyone else’s?
Which Steps song was in contention?
It was the Best Newcomer award wasn’t it? Rather than an award based on an individual song? Or is my memory playing tricks on me?
Wonderful post and astute comments from #1,#3 and #4. Brilliant song imho.