The Story Behind "The Fairytale of New York" by the Pogues feat. Kirsty MacColl

 80s, Alternative, Flashback Fridays, Holidays, Music, Pop Culture, Retro, Video  1 Response »
Nov 302012
 

The Pogues released “Fairy­tale of New York,” an Irish-inspired folk bal­lad, in Novem­ber 1987. It reached #1 on the Irish Sin­gle Charts and #2 on the U.K. Sin­gles Chart. The tune is con­sid­ered to be the best Christ­mas song ever by res­i­dents of Ire­land and the U.K., even though it’s not espe­cially sen­ti­men­tal. The title was inspired by J. P. Donleavy’s 1961 novel, A Fairy Tale of New York.

The song fea­tures British singer/songwriter Kirsty Mac­Coll, who was mar­ried to Steve Lil­ly­white, the pro­ducer for the Pogues’ If I Should Fall from Grace with God album. Lil­ly­white asked Mac­Coll to record a guide vocal on the demo of the song; how­ever, the Pogues liked MacColl’s per­for­mance so much, they invited her to sing on the final recording.

The song tells the story of an Irish imi­grant, Pogues’ lead singer Shane Mac­Gowan, who is thrown into the New York City Police Department’s (NYPD) drunk tank on Christ­mas Eve to sleep off an alcohol-infused binge. Mac­Gowan hears an old man sing “The Rare Old Moun­tain Dew,” an Irish bal­lad, and rem­i­nisces about MacColl’s char­ac­ter, and the song morphs into a call and response between Mac­Gowan and Mac­Coll. A Sina­tra ref­er­ences makes it unclear whether the song is set in the ‘50s or early ‘80s.

Sup­pos­edly, the song evolved from a story about a sailor and a dis­tant ocean to the the tale of two lovers who are down on their luck at Christmas.

After being denied the #1 spot the week of Christ­mas by the Pet Shop Boy’s cover of Elvis Presley’s “Always on My Mind,” Mac­Gowan is rumored to have com­mented, “We were beaten by two queens and a drum machine.”

After MacColl’s death on Decem­ber 18, 2000, “Fairy­tale of New York” has been released in Ire­land and the U.K. every Christ­mas sea­son since 2005. Pro­ceeds have been donated to var­i­ous home­less char­i­ties and Jus­tice for Kirsty, a cam­paign to inves­ti­gate MacColl’s death in Mex­ico. Since songs can now chart with­out a phys­i­cal release, “Fairy­tale of New York” has man­aged to place in the Top 20 for the past seven years, result­ing in it being the 22nd longest run­ner of all time.

The song gen­er­ated some con­tro­versy in 2007 when BBC Radio 1 decided to edit out the words “slut” and “fag­got,” so as not to offend any­one. After receiv­ing crit­i­cism from MacColl’s mother and lis­ten­ers, the unedited ver­sion of “Fairy­tale of New York” returned to the airwaves.

Coin­ci­den­tally, Mac­Gowan was born on Christ­mas Day.

Ver­sions
The Fairy­tale of New York 4’35

Music Video
The music video fea­tures actor Matt Dil­lon as a police­man throw­ing Pogues’ lead singer, Shane Mac­Gowan, in the NYPD’s drunk tank, inter­cut with footage of the Pogues and Kirsty Mac­Coll per­form­ing the song in a stu­dio and Mac­Gowan and Mac­Coll walk­ing the streets of New York City.

Although the lyrics refer to the NYPD choir singing “Gal­way Bay,” the NYPD does not actu­ally have a choir. Instead, the NYPD Pipes and Drums unit is fea­tured in the music video. Since Pipes and Drum unit did not know “Gal­way Bay,” the footage of them is slowed down to dis­guise the fact they were play­ing a dif­fer­ent song.

Mem­o­ries
I can’t remem­ber exactly when I first heard “The Fairy­tale of New York,” but for the longest time I con­fused it with the Pogues’ and Kirsty MacColl’s “Miss Otis Regrets/Just One of Those Things” from the Red Hot + Blue com­pi­la­tion. I was quite sur­prised, how­ever, to learn it was con­sid­ered to be a Christ­mas song a few years after its release. Most hol­i­days songs are nos­tal­gic and recall details of hap­pier times, whereas the sub­ject and lyrics of “Fairy­tale of New York” con­tain about as much hol­i­day cheer as acid thrown in one’s face. Per­haps that’s why it res­onates with lis­ten­ers, because some­times life (and the hol­i­days) aren’t all mulled apple cider and a slice of pump­kin pie.

What are your mem­o­ries of “The Fairy­tale of New York” by the Pogues feat. Kirsty MacColl?

Top Ten Signs of a Hipster Christmas

 Alternative, Humor, Parody, Pop Culture, Retro, Top Ten Thursdays, Urban Life  No Responses »
Nov 292012
 

You may have been won­der­ing about those new kids who have moved into the rental house next door.  What kind of peo­ple are they?  Vin­tage clothes, rid­ing scoot­ers, name-dropping … Could they be hip­sters?  Since we’re in the midst of the hol­i­day sea­son, here are ten signs of a hip­ster Xmas:

01. Tat­too of Blitzen the Rein­deer passed out amongst a moun­tain of empty Pabst Blue Rib­bon cans

02. Design an Xmas font for invi­ta­tions to pagan win­ter sol­stice party because it’s ironic

03. Vin­tage, light-up snow­man on front lawn is wear­ing shut­ter shades

04. Hemp Xmas wreath … imported from Sweden

05. Poster of Che Gue­vara wear­ing a Santa hat on front door

06. Decon­struct cas­settes and use the mag­netic tape as gar­land on Xmas tree

07. Sew white faux fur trim to retro red vel­vet bowl­ing shirt

08. Ride Ves­pas door-to-door to go caroling

09. Fruit­cake made with cof­fee and cigarettes

10. Every time they sing “Deck the Halls” they gig­gle as if it’s some pri­vate joke

11. Voodoo doll gin­ger­bread men

LGBT Community Flocks to Chick-Fil-A Alternative

 Alternative, Food, Gay, Humor, LGBT, Parody, Politics, Tall Tale Tuesdays  No Responses »
Aug 142012
 

After learn­ing that Chick-Fil-A donated money to the Fam­ily Research Coun­cil, an orga­ni­za­tion that falsely links homo­sex­u­al­ity to pedophilia, Jo Jo Gon­za­les found him­self at a fork in the road:  Do I choose LGBT rights?  Or do I choose a deep-fried chicken sand­wich?  Then a thought occurred to him–Why can’t I have both?

Gon­za­les and his boyfriend, Eddie O’Hara, decided to open an alter­na­tive to Chick-Fil-A that sup­ports same-sex mar­riage.  Thus, they have opened their first Cock-a-Grill-a-Do in Decatur, Geor­gia.  “Eddie is Irish, so we had orig­i­nally intended to call it the Bent Cock, which is British slang for gay.  When we tried it out on poten­tial cus­tomers, it stirred in their minds the images of a sex club, not a chicken sand­wich, so we had to rethink our plan.”

The Cock-a-Grill-a-Do expe­ri­ence begins as the cus­tomer walks through the doors of the hot pink barn facade and is greeted by hunky, shirt­less cashiers who eagerly await to take his order.  At the moment, there are only two sand­wich options:  The Dirty Birdy, which is a deep-fried chicken sand­wich, and the Cock-a-Grill-a-Do, which is the grilled chicken alter­na­tive.  The cus­tomer may spec­ify if he wants his sand­wich with spe­cial sauce (with a money shot) or dry (a la safe sex).  Instead of  waf­fle fries, Cock-a-Grill-a-Do offers Chicken Scratch Fries, a lat­ticed potato vari­a­tion with a spicy sea­son­ing.  For dessert, choose from Aunt Earl’s Egg-straordinary Ice­box Pie or Mis­sis­sissy Mud Brownie.  Cock-a-Grill-a-Do turns lemon­ade on its rind with their refresh­ing adult bev­er­age inspired lemon-fey’d.

After plac­ing his order, the cus­tomer can relax by lis­ten­ing to chicken-fried takes on clas­sic disco songs:  “Ring My Neck” instead of “Ring My Bell,” “Let’s All Cluck” instead of “Let’s All Chant,” and “Le Beak” instead of “Le Freak.”  When the food is ready, go-go boys in feath­ered g-strings with elab­o­rate tails slide down a pole from where the kitchen is in the hay loft and deliver the food to the customer’s table.  Cus­tomers are also treated to cock fights on the hour when sexy boys dressed in skimpy chicken-inspired cos­tumes climb into the ring in the cen­ter of a din­ing room for cock fights.

So far, busi­ness has been phe­nom­e­nal, but Gon­za­lez and O’Hara have received crit­i­cism from les­bians who feel that Cock-a-Grill-a-Do caters toward gay men–not women.  “We’re plan­ning to add a hen house in the back of the park­ing lot where we’ll serve organic and veg­e­tar­ian options,” said Gon­za­les, “as well as acoustic music about chickens.”

When asked if they feel Cock-a-Grill-a-Do suc­ceeds in pro­vid­ing a chicken sand­wich in an envi­ron­ment that sup­ports same-sex mar­riage, Gon­za­les and O’Hara look at each other.  “You know, we got so swept up in the fab­u­lous­ness of the idea, that we for­got all about that.”

The Story Behind "It's the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)" by R.E.M.

 80s, Alternative, Flashback Fridays, Music, Pop Culture, Retro, Video  No Responses »
Aug 032012
 

 

R.E.M. released “It’s the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)” on Novem­ber 16, 1987. It reached #69 on the U.S. Bill­board Hot 100 and #39 on the U.K. Sin­gles Charts on its re-release in 1991. The song is sim­i­lar in melody to “P.S.A. (Pub­lic Ser­vice Announce­ment)”. P.S.A. was later released as a sin­gle in 2003 as “Bad Day.” The song is in the tra­di­tion Bb Dylan’s “Sub­ter­ranean Home­sick Blues.”

Ver­sions
“It’s the End of the World As We Know It (And I Feel Fine)” 4’04

Music Video
James Her­bert directed this music video, which fea­tures a young skate­boarder explor­ing an old house and hold­ing up what he finds.

Mem­o­ries
I remem­ber MTV play­ing this music video a lot. I ended up buy­ing the Epony­mous from the CBS Colum­bia House Music Club on CD and includ­ing the song on mix tapes for the car. I still don’t know all of the words

What are your mem­o­ries of “It’s the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)” by R.E.M.?

The Story Behind "People Are People" by Depeche Mode

 80s, Alternative, Flashback Fridays, Music, Pop Culture, Retro, Synth-Pop, Video  1 Response »
Mar 092012
 

Depeche Mode released their tenth sin­gle, “Peo­ple Are Peo­ple,” on March 10, 1984. It charted at #4 in the U.K. (their high­est plac­ing at that time) and topped the charts in West Ger­many. In the U.S., the sin­gle was ini­tially only played on col­lege radio, but even­tu­ally crossed over onto Top 40 radio and peaked at #13 on the Bill­board 100 in May 1985. “Peo­ple Are Peo­ple” was Depeche Mode’s first big hit in the U.S.

Key­boardist Mar­tin Gore, who wrote most of the band’s songs after Vince Clarke left the band in 1981, is not fond of “Peo­ple Are Peo­ple.” He prefers songs that are more ambigu­ous and leave more to the listener’s inter­pre­ta­tion, while this song is too obvi­ous. Depeche Mode has not played “Peo­ple Are Peo­ple” in con­cert since 1988.

Sire Records released a com­pi­la­tion album for North Amer­ica only enti­tled Peo­ple Are Peo­ple, which included the title track, plus sev­eral pre­vi­ous Depeche Mode sin­gles (“Get the Bal­ance Right!,” a dif­fer­ent ver­sion of “Love, in Itself,” and “Every­thing Counts”), includ­ing “Leave in Silence,” which had never been released in the U.S. There­fore, when Sire released the com­pi­la­tion Catch­ing Up with Depeche Mode the fol­low­ing year, these sin­gles were left off the album, unlike the non-U.S. ver­sion, The Sin­gles 81–85, which was released in the rest of the world.

Ver­sions
Peo­ple Are Peo­ple [7″ Ver­sion] 3’43
Peo­ple Are Peo­ple [Album Ver­sion] 3’52
Peo­ple Are Peo­ple [Dif­fer­ent Mix] 7’11
Peo­ple Are Peo­ple [On-USound Mix] 7’30

Music Video
Clive Richard­son directed the music video for “Peo­ple Are Peo­ple” on the HMS Belfast. The group mem­bers ring bells and play var­i­ous part of the ship like a musi­cal instru­ment, inter­spersed with wartime footage and close­ups of Depeche Mode records being pressed. It’s nei­ther an inter­est­ing video nor a favorite of the band. The video does cap­ture lead singer Dave Gahan with his bleached flat top and keyboardist/song writer Mar­tin Gore in his rub­ber Berlin fetish wear phase. A longer ver­sion of the video backed with “Peo­ple Are Peo­ple [Dif­fer­ent Mix]” is avail­able on their video com­pi­la­tion Some Great Videos.

Mem­o­ries
I dis­tinctly remem­ber hear­ing “Peo­ple Are Peo­ple” on the radio as I and some friends from high school drove to see A View to a Kill at a movie the­ater in down­town Fort Worth. I stopped to fill up my car at Race Track and Delinda and Cherry snuck into the men’s room and bought some joy jelly from the con­dom machine. Delinda rubbed it on Cherry’s calf and blew on it, but Cherry didn’t report any pleas­ant warm­ing sensation.

Any­way, I liked this song at the time it was pop­u­lar, most likely because of the per­cus­sion and indus­trial sound, but it grew repet­i­tive quickly. I for­got about Depeche Mode until my neigh­bor Deb­bie came home from col­lege with Catch­ing Up with Depeche Mode, Some Great Reward, and Black Cel­e­bra­tion. I remem­ber being taken back by how dark songs like “Blas­phe­mous Rumours” and “New Dress” were, espe­cially since I was immersed in Bana­narama and a-ha at the time. I bor­rowed the cas­settes and played them, even­tu­ally buy­ing my own copy of Catch­ing Up with Depeche Mode. In the fol­low­ing years, I got on board with “Strangelove,” “Never Let Me Down Again,” “Behind the Wheel,” “Per­sonal Jesus,” “Enjoy the Silence,” “Pol­icy of Truth,” and “World in My Eyes.”

After I fin­ished col­lege and was liv­ing on my own, I came across a copy of Some Great Videos in a Half Price Books and pur­chased it. Watch­ing the videos, I fell in love with Depeche Mode’s ear­lier synth-pop songs and began col­lect­ing the sin­gles and albums. Still, even after all of these years, when­ever I hear “Peo­ple Are Peo­ple,” I think of that defec­tive love jelly.

What are your mem­o­ries of “Peo­ple Are Peo­ple” by Depeche Mode?

The Story Behind "Moments in Love" by Art of Noise

 80s, Alternative, Creativitiy, Flashback Fridays, Music, Pop Culture, Retro, Synth-Pop, Video  2 Responses »
Feb 102012
 

Although it had orig­i­nally been included on Art of Noise’s Into Bat­tle EP in 1983, “Moments in Love” wasn’t released as a com­mer­cial A-side until April 1, 1985.  It peaked at #51 in the U.K. and was a mod­er­ate hit on the U.S. R&B Chart. The song is an ethe­real instru­men­tal that fea­tures just three words as the lyrics: Moments in love.

In 1983, pro­ducer Trevor had just pro­duced ABC’s highly suc­cess­ful Lex­i­con of Love album and would have even greater suc­cess the fol­low­ing year with Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s Wel­come to the Plea­sure­dome. Bring­ing together a Royal Col­lege of Music grad­u­ate (Anne Dud­ley), arranger J.J. Jecza­lik, and engi­neer Gary Lan­gan, along with fel­low ZTT Records founder and Ex-NME jour­nal­ist Paul Mor­ley, Horn cre­ated Art of Noise, the antithe­sis of main­stream rock. Exper­i­ment­ing with the Fairlight CMI, Art of Noise were pio­neers in sam­pling, cre­at­ing sound col­lages as a face­less group whose music was more art than pop. They attracted atten­tion with sin­gles like “Beat Box” and “Close (To the Edit).” How­ever, a strug­gle for cre­ative con­trol led to the band split­ting acri­mo­niously from Horn and Mor­ley. Art of Noise went on wint a Grammy Award in 1986 with the more com­mer­cial “Peter Gunn” fea­tur­ing Duane Eddy.

““Moments in Love” was fea­tured in the 1985 doc­u­men­tary Pump­ing Iron II — The Women.  Madonna walked down the aisle to “Moments in Love” when she mar­ried Sean Penn in 1985.  L.L. Cool J sam­pled “Moments in Love” for his 1987 hit “I Need Love.”

Ver­sions
Moments in Love [7″ Ver­sion] 4’41
Moments in Love [Edit] 3’59
Moments in Love [Vocal Edit] 1’26
Moments in Love [Beaten]/Love 6’59
Moments in Love [Album Version/Original Ver­sion] 10’15
Love Beat 5’15
(Three Fin­gers Of) Love/Love Beat [Edit] 5’15

Music Video
The music video for “Moments in Love” revolves around a cou­ple ice skat­ing in front of a var­ied group of spec­ta­tors.  One man in a mask, seems to have painful flash­backs of a boy (likely him­self) con­tem­plat­ing a tor­toise in his hands.  A male and a female band play to the side, with she lip-synching the title of the song.  By the end of the video, the masked man presents the ice skat­ing cou­ple with two golden tor­toises.  Sup­pos­edly, the music video rep­re­sented how the lethargy of main­stream rock music.

Mem­o­ries
“Moments in Love” is another one of those songs that I can’t remem­ber the first time I heard it, yet it always seemed to have been around in the periph­ery of my teenage years.  I became obsessed with the song in early 1996 and drove from Dal­las to Irv­ing to Arling­ton before I found a copy of their first com­pi­la­tion, Daft, which included three ver­sions:  “Love,” “Moments in Love,” and “(Three Fin­gers of) Love,” which is also known as “Love Beat.”  Although the days were warm that March, the nights still con­tained a chill, yet I would slide open the glass door to my bal­cony, light can­dles, and watch the breeze blow the sheer cur­tains as “Moments in Love” played over and over.  It’s one of those songs where the beauty of the music speaks to the lis­tener in an emo­tional lan­guage that has no words.

What are your mem­o­ries of “Moments in Love” by Art of Noise? 

The Story Behind "I Melt with You" by Modern English

 80s, Alternative, Flashback Fridays, Music, New Wave, Pop Culture, Retro, Video  No Responses »
Feb 032012
 

Mod­ern Eng­lish released “I Melt with You” on August 6, 1982. It peaked at 78 on the U.S. Bill­board 100. The music video was in heavy rota­tion on MTV in early 1983, while the song was fea­tured in the movie Val­ley Girl. The song is rumored to be about a cou­ple mak­ing love as the world ends via nuclear annihilation.

The band broke up in 1986, but the lead vocal­ist, Rob­bie Grey, formed a new ver­sion of Mod­ern Eng­lish and released a re-recorded ver­sion of “I Melt with You” in 1991. The band dis­banded again, shortly thereafter.

The orig­i­nal line up got back together to tour in 2010 and recorded a dras­ti­cally dif­fer­ent ver­sion of “I Melt with You” for the film of the same name. This song was avail­able to down­load for free on their offi­cial web­site, but I could not down­load it, anymore.

Ver­sions
I Melt with You [7″ Mix] 3’50
I Melt with You [Album Ver­sion] 4’10
I Melt with You [Toke’s Rock the Radio Mix] 4’16
I Melt with You [Stop the Radio Mix] 3’58
I Melt with You [Toke’s Rock the World Mix] 5’45
I Melt with You [Carl’s Stop the World Mix] 7’27
I Melt with You [Carl’s Clubs the World] 4’46
I Melt with You [Bass Melt­down Mix] 6’02

Music Video
The music video for “I Melt with You” is basi­cally a per­for­mance video, with a cou­ple in 1940s-style cloth­ing danc­ing around the band. The leader singer chan­nels some Marc Almond circa Soft Cell fash­ion. Near the end of the song, there is a close up of a flick­er­ing flame, then a com­po­si­tion of the danc­ing cou­ple and band mem­bers in a diag­o­nal line. A light flashes behind the cou­ple, which sym­bol­izes a nuclear explosion.

Mem­o­ries
This is another one of those songs that every­one seems to know, even if radio play was infre­quent. From the begin­ning strums of the jan­glely gui­tar, the song is instantly rec­og­niz­able. The dri­ving per­cus­sion really pow­ers the song, though. It’s also a tune that every­one seems to have a fond­ness for, per­haps due to nos­tal­gia. And, really, what could be more roman­tic than hook­ing up with some­one before nuclear apoc­a­lypse? Ah, romance …

What are your mem­o­ries of “I Melt with You” by Mod­ern English?

The Story Behind "Peek-a-Boo" by Siouxsie and the Banshees

 80s, Alternative, Flashback Fridays, Music, Pop Culture, Retro, Video  3 Responses »
Jan 132012
 


Siouxsie and the Ban­shees released “Peek-a-Boo” on July 11, 1988.  It peaked at #16 on the U.K. Sin­gles Chart and #53 on the U.S. Bill­board Hot 100, which was their first time to chart in the U.S. “Peek-a-Boo” was also the first #1 song on Billboard’s newly cre­ated Mod­ern Rock Chart in Sep­tem­ber ’88.

The song actu­ally began life on their prior album, Through the Look­ing Glass, when they recorded a cover of John Cale’s “Gun.” It was orig­i­nally recorded as a B-Side to their sin­gle, a cover of Iggy Pop’s “The Pas­sen­ger.” The band cre­ated a loop from a brass sec­tion of the track, then played it back­wards, which cre­ated the the spine of the unusual back­ing track. The group added other instru­ments, and Siouxsie recorded her vocals with two micro­phones, so that the song gives the impres­sion that she’s singing with her­self. Real­iz­ing that “Peek-a-Boo” deserved to be a sin­gle itself, the band saved it for their next album, Peepshow. It took a year to fin­ish the pro­duc­tion of the song.

The band even­tu­ally gave Harry War­ren and Johnny Mer­cer a co-writing credit, as the lyrics “golly jeepers/where’d you get those peepers/peepshow, creepshow/where did you get those eyes” were sim­i­lar to the lyrics in “Jeep­ers Creepers.”

Ver­sions
Peek-a-Boo 3’13
Peek-a-Boo [Big Spender Mix] 6’11
Peek-a-Boo [Sil­ver Dol­lar Mix] 10’00
Peek-a-Boo [Stock­hausen & Water­phone Mix Inst.] 6’04

Music Video
The music video is a jump-cut extrav­a­ganza of graph­ics, shad­ows, strobe lights, masks, and feath­ers. Siouxsie, in a black bob, sings to the cam­era as she dances in and out of the dark­ness. Mean­while, the band mem­bers sport masks and ape play­ing brass instru­ments and accor­dions. It’s good fun, with an art deco twist.

Mem­o­ries
When I first saw the video for “Peek-a-Boo” on MTV’s 120 Min­utes, I imme­di­ately fell in love with every­thing about it:  the odd per­cus­sion, eerie accor­dion, provoca­tive lyrics, Siouxsie’s detached vocal, the shad­ows and blue-silver of the video.  It was also the first time that I had ever heard Siouxsie and the Ban­shees on Top 40 radio, and they played “Peek-a-Boo” a lot, which may explain why the song spoke to me so much.  I lived with one foot firmly planted in the alter­na­tive music world, and the other foot in the pop world.  “Peek-a-Boo” was a fusion of both styles, with even some hip hop influ­ence evi­dent.  I recall many an autumn after­noon of blast­ing “Peek-a-Boo” out the win­dows and sun­roof of my ’71 Yel­low VW Super­bee­tle on my way to school, work at Tar­get, then back to school for rehearsal.

My only com­plaint about the song was that the U.S. 12″ only included the Sil­ver Dol­lar Mix, which stripped many of the fea­tures of the orig­i­nal ver­sion that I liked so much.  Plus, the remix was 10 min­utes long, and I tend to get ner­vous if a song goes over eight minutes.

What are your mem­o­ries of “Peek-a-Boo” by Siouxsie and the Banshees?