If you sound bitter, it sounds very much like — as Baldrick would say — “a bag of grapefruits to me”. And it also makes me glad that you didn’t win, because if you’re such a bad sport, then maybe either you’re not fit to take part in such a contest, or you’re an arrogant son-of-a-bitch who is expects to win, and therefore needs to be spoonfed a whole heap of humility through a few defeats (the heavier the better).

And that’s one of the reasons that I’m delighted Rage Against The Machine got the Christmas number one. Additional reasons would include that I don’t like the X-factor, I don’t like being forced to listen to whichever good singer (because let’s be fair, they are) meets with Simon Cowell’s approval this year (I like musicians who can play instruments, instead) and also I like Rage Against The Machine.

And, whilst I’m happy — for obvious reasons — that Newcastle beat Middlesbrough yesterday, Gordon Strachan’s post match comments have made me even happier about it. I’d always had a lot of time for Gordon as a manager, and I accept he’s under pressure at the moment, having managed to accumulate only 0.67 points per game in his 9 games so far, as opposed to the manager he replaced who was managing a 1.77 per game over 13 games which was not deemed good enough. So yeah, I’d say he’s under pressure.

But really, if you can’t be gracious in defeat (and in victory), then you shouldn’t be allowed to play the game. My kids would be told off if they had a temper tantrum just because they didn’t get their own way and maybe someone ought to have a word with these people. Just have a read of these quotes and tell me how sour, exactly, their grapes appear to be:

SIMON COWELL has blasted the campaign to get RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE to the festive top spot – branding its supporters “a hate mob”. He says the Facebook crusade to keep this year’s X Factor winner from being the Christmas No1 is akin to bullying.The Sun

This — and the next statement — were both before the winner was announced. Simon, Cheryl, if you can’t stand the heat, you know what you have to do…

I cannot bear to see him lose out to a mean campaign that has nothing to do with his efforts. If that song, or should I say campaign, by an American group is our Christmas No 1 I’ll be gutted for him and our charts.Cheryl Cole, quoted in The Guardian

I particularly like the Cheryl quote, coming as it does with slight overtones of jingoism bordering on racism. Bloody foreigners, coming over here, taking our Christmas number ones…

I don’t recall her complaining about any other non-Brit being top of the charts at any other time, so I can’t help but wonder whether there’s perhaps more to it than she’s suggesting.

And then contrast that with Joe McEddery, who was the one who actually came second in the Christmas chart battle:

McElderry, 18, praised the campaign, adding: “It’s been exciting to be part of a much-hyped battle and they definitely deserve congratulations. [...] This time last year I never thought for one minute that I’d win The X Factor, never mind about having a debut single out, so I’m just delighted to be in the charts.BBC News: Rage Against The Machine Beat X Factor In Charts

That is how to lose graciously. Good luck for the rest of your career, Joe.

But back to those ungracious bastards. Middlesbrough lost to Newcastle yesterday. During the game, Alan Smith of Newcastle was forced off by injury after being repeatedly fouled by Boro players; later on in the game, Pogatetz clearly handled the ball in the penalty area, denying Newcastle a third goal.

Yet did Gordon Strachan see these things as “evening themselves out over the course of a season” (or even possibly a match, in this case?). Well obviously not.

Everyone agrees there was a blatant shove in the back in the build up to the goal. That is what happens when you are Newcastle and everything goes with you. It was a penalty too. It was a good save from Taylor. He stretched his hand and fingers out to get it.Gordon Strachan, quoted on Vital Football

Yes, the ball struck Steven Taylor’s hand near the goal line. Whether or not it was deliberate (I think probably not, he was just turning to face the play), it probably should have been a penalty. Also, there was certainly contact between Ameobi and Pogatetz — whether a foul I’m less sure as Pogatetz seemed to go to ground very easily. But there was nothing at all wrong with Newcastle’s second goal — which is presumably why Strachan doesn’t mention it.

Not once, anywhere, in any of the press reports I have read about the match, have I heard Gordon quoted to say anything remotely positive about Newcastle (the context that the quote “They have experience. It’s a man’s team” gave the implication that Newcastle were better at cheating). Nowhere have I heard him mention the clear penalty Newcastle should have had. Nowhere have I heard him mention Newcastle’s undisputably fine second goal. Nowhere have I heard him mention any of the decisions that went for Middlesbrough. Sour grapes. Bad loser. I don’t have anything against Boro (beyond obviously wanting Newcastle to win); I know Boro fans and I have a great deal of sympathy for the fans because Newcastle have been through pretty much the same mill over the last year or so (although we’ve been ahead on ‘national laughing stock’).

But until Gordon Strachan learns how to lose graciously, and accept that sometimes his team, or his players, or his decisions weren’t as good as those of the opposition, I’m going to keep hoping he loses, because obviously he needs more practice at losing to stop him being such a bad loser. And you can add Grumpychops Wenger to that school while you’re on…

Compare this to Chris Hughton’s comments after Newcastle lost to Nottingham Forest earlier in the season:

We paid the price for a poor first-half performance when they were much better than us. I just wanted to get the players in without conceding a goal and see if we could change and improve things. But Forest scoring just before half-time left us with a bigger challenge and although we responded to it, we just could not get the break. BBC News

Again, he’s getting over the point that he feels his team were unlucky, but he also actually is prepared to give the victors a certain amount of credit: – “they were much better than us”. That, Gordon, is something you could learn from.

In what may be an unusual step here, I’m going to be clear that I don’t have anything against Simon personally. He’s very good at what he does, he might be a lovely bloke to friends and family and so on; it’s just that the what he does is the bit I don’t like.

I’m a bit sick of every bleeding Christmas having the Christmas number one being the latest ballad-shit churned out by whoever has happened to win a particular talent show that year, simply because they won that talent show and garnered all of the associated publicity, as opposed to all of the other talented bands and musicians who don’t get a free slot on primetime saturday night telly to promote their product.

Unless of course they are part of the judging panel, in which case they do and, quelle surprise, their record turns out to be a hit.

Which is why I was delighted to encounter a facebook group dedicated to trying to get something different to be the Christmas number one. This has the added advantage that the song is by a band I love: Rage Against The Machine, so even though I own the album, I’m happy to purchase the particular song again anyway. It’s the least I can do after spending much of my younger days bouncing around to it at various rock clubs.

The song Killing In The Name is a teensy bit on the sweary side, so if you’re not up for that, you are under no obligation to listen to it whatsoever. And you’ll probably not be reading this blog in the first place. But please do still buy it, to attempt to stop the inevitable X-factor leaving a trail of shitty pop plastered all over the Christmas charts. Besides which, Simon Cowell thinks the whole idea is stupid, and if that isn’t a good reason to be right behind it, I don’t know what is…

Oh, and then we come to the nice bit. Whilst the record companies ultimately behind the singles are exactly the same (Sony, I think), RATM have long been supporters of the homeless and so the site RATM4XMAS is suggesting that people consider also donating to Shelter — who have received more than £33,000 so far from fans donating. Is that not a better way to spend your money than voting on some pissy talent show?

So, let’s give a warm hand to Simon Cowell, accept he’s very good at what he does but say that for this one year at least, we’d like something else to succeed. Let’s stick two fingers up at “the man” and buy what we want to buy, not just because it’s placed in front of us.

Fuck you, I won’t buy what you tell me

…of course, this also applies to this song. If you don’t want to buy Rage Against The Machine, you might also wish to consider purchasing the wonderfully talented comedian Tim Minchin’s White Wine In the Sun (Live) if you’re after something more Christmassy (although still somewhat alternative).

But please do consider buying Killing In The Name. It’s not particularly Christmassy, but that never stopped Mad World or Stop The Cavalry (seriously, it mentions Christmas once — and that almost incidentally — it’s an anti-war song, not a Christmas one). And it’s top-quality full on rock stuff. And if it persuades you to buy more of their stuff, then everyone’s a winner…

Obviously if you aren’t based in the North East, or don’t fancy any guitar tuition, this will be of considerably less use to you, which is why I’m keeping this post short…

The Adverts released a song called Gary Gilmore’s Eyes, which was decried as being somewhat in bad taste (probably a fair point), which asked what it would be like to be the recipient of Gary Gilmore’s eyes.

Now I do have a reason for bringing up a song released 22 years ago. I came across an interesting article on the BBC which suggests that:

Most people have a strong aversion to the idea of receiving a donor organ from a killer [...] they would be far happier receiving a transplant from someone with a good moral backgroundBBC News

They go on to suggest that one in three people who have received an organ transplant believe that they have taken on some aspects of the donor’s personality. Obviously in the case of a killer, the crux of the matter would be — and this is where the song picks up the idea perfectly — would you look at people in precisely the same way?

The eye receives the messages,
And sends them to the brain.
No guarantee the stimuli must be perceived the same…
When looking through Gary Gilmore’s eyes.The Adverts: Gary Gilmore’s Eyes

Now that’s an interesting topic. I suppose I too would have a preference that any donor organs I was ever to receive hadn’t come from a nasty person, but not to the extent that I’d turn them down if I needed a transplant. But do I believe in organ transplants changing your personality?

Well, yes but no, to be honest. After all, if one in three people think their personality has changed, this would mean that two in three people don’t. Secondly, you’d have to explain some mechanism whereby the donor’s personality wasn’t associated with either their brain (or, if you are so inclined, their soul) and has somehow been partially transplanted at the same time.

But I’m prepared to concede that some changes may be possible. I personally don’t know enough about the science to rule it out (others may have this knowledge) but I would presume that a donor organ would have some physiological differences, which might relate themselves to different chemical balances, which may impact upon the personality in some ways. There are a lot of mights in there. I don’t think it’s likely, but without further knowledge (whether from someone who already knows, or original research), I wouldn’t like to say I’m sure.

Equally though, there are other logical reasons why your personality might change. You’ll just have had a life-threatening experience, and major bloody surgery for a start. You also might well feel gratitude that is difficult to express — because if the person you are feeling grateful to hadn’t died, you’d have no reason to be grateful. So that’s a bit odd. I think these things are likely to have some impact upon your personality.

There are now more than 70 documented cases [...] where transplant patients have taken on some of the personality traits of the organ donors. Professor Gary Schwartz and his co-workers at the University of Arizona have documented numerous seemingly inexplicable experiences similar to Sonny’s. And every single one is a direct challenge to the medical status quo.Mail Online

And then you’ve got confirmation bias. I don’t know how many transplants there are per year, but I’d guess we’ve clocked up our millionth global transplant by now. If someone has clocked up 70 cases where the personality has changed and is more like the donor, that’s hardly a surprise. If 1/10th of transplant cases have a personality change, then the change is either going to make them more or less like the personality of the donor — call that 50/50? So we’d expect 1 in 20 (hey, call it 1 in 50 if you like) to have a personality more like the donor.

With about a million transplants, that would be 50,000 at 1 in 20, or 20,000 cases at 1 in 50 where we would expect this to occur pretty much by chance. Now it might be that people aren’t really looking for this, so if they looked closely, they’d find more, but 70 cases where we’d expect to see at least 20,000 isn’t exactly convincing. Every time you find another case that seems to fit, you add it to your “ahah!” list; the cases which don’t fit don’t attract your attention. That’s confirmation bias.

As I say, I don’t know it’s nonsense, but I’d need a lot more convincing. And examples like this hardly convince anyone:

She believes that she must have picked up her new characteristics from the donor, a 59-year-old man who died from an aneurysm. Now, not only has her personality changed, the single mother also claims that her tastes in literature have taken a dramatic turn. Whereas she only used to read low-brow novels, Dostoevsky has become her author of choice since the transplant.Daily Telegraph

Note that there’s no indication whatsoever that the donor liked Dostoevsky: the assumption is seemingly that because she didn’t previously read Dostoevsky, and now she does, that it must be related to her transplant, and that the donor must themselves have liked Dostoevsky. That’s one heck of an assumption. On that basis, I must have had a transplant about five years ago that I wasn’t aware of from someone who liked detective stories, because I didn’t used to read crime fiction and now I do.

I’m not saying it’s nonsense, I’m just saying that I am not yet aware of any credible evidence. So — assuming I needed them, and the organs were in good condition — I’d be quite prepared to be looking through Gary Gilmore’s eyes, hearing through Dennis Nilsen’s ears, breathing through Jeffrey Dahmer’s lungs or even filtering water through Jack the Ripper’s kidneys. But it does (and has, repeatedly) made for a good story or plot hook.

[hmm: tempted to change post title to 'filtering water through Jack the Ripper's kidneys' now...]

Of course, if you know different, do tell…

One of the other things I used to do was buy CDs. I still do buy CDs, but despite having more disposable income now (although having said that, an awful lot of my income is disposed of by the means of having two children), I now buy less CDs than I used to when I was a student.

Partly this was because as a student I was simply exposed to more music: going to rock clubs, having a big bunch of mates all into music, all recommending different bands and tracks to one another, there was bound to be a certain musical crossover. For example, I’ll give a big shout-out to Loz for getting me into bands like Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy and PWEI; meanwhile I did my best to spread knowledge of Jello Biafra and the band Dead Kennedys.

I first came across the band Die Krupps before attending university, when a friend — I suspect with the initials MF — introduced me to their work A Tribute to Metallica, which is basically covers of Metallica songs done in the Die Krupps style — which is basically German industrial rock/dance.

So I can’t remember whether it was me or my other heavy rocking housemate Steve who first came across Die Krupps in the little independent record shop we visited. I suspect it was him, although if I recall correctly we ended up buying different albums. I think he bought Die Krupps II: The Final Option, and I bought the slightly heavier remixed version Die Krupps: The Final Remixes, featuring remixes by the likes of Clawfinger and Revolting Cocks.

But the album, purchased in 1994, has stuck with me for some reason over the last fifteen years, always remaining in my ‘top 10 most listened to’ pile, regardless of what other music shifted in and out of there over the period. So for that reason when I found myself in HMV the other day idly leafing through the Rock and Pop ‘D’ section and out leapt Volle Kraft Null Acht.

I did have a certain degree of wariness about picking it up, for two reasons. Firstly, The Final Remixes dealt with songs which were sung in English. These are in German. I don’t speak, or understand German (although I can find translations of the lyrics). Secondly, it’s not exactly a new album. It’s a re-release of their second studio album from 1982. On the other hand, it is a remixes version of this album. And I did like their other remixed stuff…

Halfway through listening to the album, and generally not understanding a word of it (except for when I’ve specifically looked up the lyrics and found translations alongside), I’ve already drawn two conclusions. Firstly, if I find any more Die Krupps remix albums, I will buy them. Secondly, I strongly suspect that this album will add to The Final Remixes and stay in my regular plays list.

So that’s an odd thing, when you consider that I don’t know whether or not I’d like their “un-remixed” stuff, and it’s unusual for me to find the lyrics almost irrelevant — I’m generally very much a lyrics man — but maybe it’s just the genre. It’s described by Wikipedia as an “industrial rock/electronic body music” thing that they do, and it does have very much a heavy metal/heavy rock vibe to it, only obviously an electronica version thereof.

I can’t imagine it will be to everyone’s taste, and some might be better advised to start with something like The Final Remixes to test the waters of the genre, as that’s got english lyrics, but if you fancy a bit of Germanic industrial dance music, and you have no objection to lyrics in German, then maybe you should head Volle Kraft veraus over to Volle Kraft Null Acht.

But on we must go, from S through to Z.

S is for …

Well, recently, I have been very impressed with the Scissor Sisters; I’ve always liked Paul Simon — in particular the ‘Graceland’ album; Steppenwolf got my motor running; System of a Down are perfect for when I need something heavy; and the Small Faces and the Stranglers have produced two of my all time favourites (with ‘Itchykoo Park’ and ‘Golden Brown’ respectively). Oh, and there’s Stiff Little Fingers.

In the end however, I was torn between my Ska and Goth sides: The Specials or The Sisters of Mercy. Again, the Specials produced one of my favourite records of all time — Ghost Town, their take on Thatcher’s Britain. But in terms of ‘most listened to’, Sisters would probably top my list; only a couple of albums, but some of the songs I just love.

But, in the end, even though for all intents and purposes I probably prefer the Sisters of Mercy to the Specials, I’m going to go for the Specials for two reasons. One because my kids love the Specials and keep asking for them in the car — “can we have the Rudy song, Dad?” — and the other because I really, really wanted to have the Ghost Town video in here.

T is for …

I was going to have a proper think about this one, and go through all of the bands that I like beginning with T, and arrive at a sensible, rational decision, but as Mark pointed out, he’d be upset if I picked the wrong band for T.

This ones for you, Mark.

Besides which, ooh yeah, I’m a rocker.

U is for …

Well not that bloody Bonio and his mates, that’s for sure. Unfortunately, this leaves me with a slightly more limited choice. There’s UB40, if I want a bit more pop-reggae; there’s Ultravox who produced the magnificent ‘Vienna’, and there’s… er…

Er… ah! There’s this lot:

V is for …

Vendetta. No, wait, that’s the film, innit?

Alternatively, going from my iPod listings, there seems to be one band who begins with V and whom I probably own more albums by than any other band. They are the internationally reknowned ‘Various Artists’. So I’ll not pick them either.

But I’ll veer away from the verve, I’ll jump away from Van Halen, and if the Vengaboys really want to go to Ibiza, they can go without me. The Village People were contenders here: real disco floor-fillers, with whom you can ‘have a good time’ when you ‘hang out with all the boys’.

But instead I’ll go for Suzanne Vega, a woman with a wonderful, powerful, and haunting voice. There’s a lot of lovely upbeat high-tempo stuff that she does — I’m quite a fan of ‘Blood Makes Noise’ — but the song that generally sticks in my head is the rather sad one told from the perspective of a sufferer of domestic abuse.

W is for …

Heh, heh.

Now, there’s a lot of quality bands or singers that I like who begin with ‘W’, but in order to piss everyone else off, I’ll restrict myself to comedy bands.

I’ll rule out Terry Wogan, as he was something of a one-hit wonder with ‘The Floral Dance’. This leaves me with two great choices, one of whom have a brand-new combine harvester. Aah, the Wurzels. Drink up thy Zider; Chitterling; In The Back of My Old Car; Twice Daily. All robust, earthy songs, which are very heavy on the old double entendre stuff (in fact, sometimes it’s laid on so thick, it’s pretty much a single entendre). The band who defined the Scrumpy & Western genre.

So it is with a degree of sadness that I tell you that I’ve not gone for them.

I’ve gone for Bob Dylan. Er… well, it looks a bit like Bob Dylan…

(Note, I know some people would file him under ‘Y’, since that’s his surname, but as I always think of him as ‘Weird Al’, he gets filed under ‘W’ in my head, okay?)

X is for …

Well, as there was only one band I could think of off-hand which began with an ‘X’ the choice was fairly straight-forward. I did double-check and additionally found the rapper Xzibit, but I’ll stick with the identity of my first choice.

…besides which, how can you not like a band when the singer is called Poly Styrene?

Y is for …

Again, a somewhat limited choice. There were a few — the Yardbirds, for example — where genuine talent was on show. The question was, who would win the race? And then, it suddenly wasn’t a question any more…

Z is for …

I know Steve’s got a good one lined up here — he’s already said so — but at this stage, and with a letter like this, it is for me simply a case of trying to work out which bands I can think of qualify, and then picking my favourite of them.

There’s a few who qualify — Rob Zombie, the Zutons, Frank Zappa, ZZ Top — but the difficulty was coming up with a favourite from this lot. I tend to remember the Spitting Image version of ZZ Top as my favourite version, with the song “We’ve Got Beards”.

Unfortunately, there’s nothing actually stands out for me here if I follow the traditional line of using the name of the artist or band. But then, there is one name which springs to mind. It’s kind of a band-within-a-band. And since I didn’t have a place for him earlier, it’s time to introduce Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars…

It’s a Mini Disc player. More specifically, it’s my Mini Disc player.

Even more specifically than that, it’s my Mini Disc player which I got some time ago, only for Mini Discs never to actually take off, and everyone to continue to stick to CDs, only now listening to them on iPods and other MP3 players.

I only ever bought one album on minidisc — Rage Against The Machine’s Evil Empire, and although I did have a handful of ‘compilation’ discs that I had put together, that was about it for the Mini Disc.

The problem was, I actually liked the minidisc player. It was nice, light, portable, allowed you to skip forward and back amongst tracks easily, in a way that tape players didn’t. It also didn’t jump about erratically, like most portable CD players would. The mini discs were small (hence the name) and so were easily portable, so you could carry around several without having your pockets stuffed full.

It’s just rather a shame that when MP3 players came out, they could do all of that stuff plus a hell of a lot more.

But arguably the important point is not why Mini Disc failed as a medium, it’s how do I make sure I don’t buy this Betamax crap any more?

J is For …

Apparently, Johnny Hates Jazz. Meanwhile, Jack dislikes both Jazz and Johnny Hates Jazz. There’s a few in here which have some resonance for me: when you’re in the need of a Metal Meltdown, Judas Priest can supply that for you: Elton John wrote ‘Your Song’, which was the song for my first dance as a married man, and at the other end of the romantic spectrum, you have Joy Division, and ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’.

But my list simply must have a place for The Modfather, and so I am happy to introduce you to The Jam, and their Town Called Malice…

K is for …

Well, there’s the Kaiser Chiefs, whom I’m quite fond of, the Kings Of Leon are growing on me, there’s the KLF who were absolutely fantastic, but the stand out winner for this letter is The Kinks. No matter which sort of mood I’m in, there’s a Kinks song that will match it: from Death of a Clown through Lola to Apeman to Sunny Afternoon to Autumn Almanac, the Kinks music covered such a range, and was so influential for other bands, that they’d probably deserve a place in here even if they weren’t that good in their own right.

But they were that good.

L is for …

Lennon. Whatever he may have been like personally (let’s remember, he was a fallible human being rather than something god-like), he was a good singer-songwriter, wasn’t he?

I’ve therefore chosen a song to illustrate this which illustrates both the fact that he was aware of his own personal imperfections, and also a song which has been covered a good many times — illustrating the quality of the song.

M is for …

There’s only really one band it could be. The band who introduced me to the genre of Heavy Metal, from where my musical tastes spread further into the much wider more eclectic mish mash it has now. I have that to be thankful to them for.

But that’s not the only reason. They have a range of tracks from thrash, through more thrash, through slower, more melodic — yet still gritty — performances. They are of course the hardcore metal monsters with Hetfield and Ulrich… Metallica.

And here they are with what in my opinion is one of their most powerful songs, Unforgiven, demonstrating that the musical tone can get your message across just as well as the frantic thrash-speed guitars which had served them well earlier.

N is for…

Well it’s certainly not Nirvana, I can tell you that much. Yes, they influenced a huge great big music ‘scene’, but I didn’t like them much to begin with, and the fact that seemingly every third student on campus at time spent about three months wandering around being all sad and generally trying to make out like they were really suffering, and that the world had lost it’s greatest ever musician really got on my nerves. So not Nirvana, then.

I almost selected Nine Inch Nails pretty much by default, because I do listen to them quite a bit. Then it occurred to me that I was missing out a band I far preferred, whom I owned more albums by, who have one of my all-time favourite tracks, and are named after something relating to the English Civil War.

They are a difficult band to pin-down: their songs are frequently angry but sometimes joyous; sometimes political, sometimes social commentary, sometimes just about life experiences. Post-punk, possibly.

Say hello to New Model Army.

O is for …

This was another problematic one. I appreciate Oasis’s talents, but I don’t like them, so that rules that one out. Des O’Connor was never in the running, nor was O.M.D. or Mike Oldfield. The problem here was that when I went through my iTunes and my CD collection, I found I didn’t actually own any albums by someone beginning with ‘O’.

It was time to call upon the book of British Hit Singles and Albums to find someone. After ruling out the Osmonds (too much in the way of teeth, and not really my genre anyway) this left me surprised at how few bands actually did begin with ‘O’. I nearly went for Roy Orbison, as I do quite like some of his stuff, but in the end, it was the video that convinced me to plump for André 3000, under the Outkast umbrella, specifically for Hey Ya!

Although rather annoyingly I couldn’t find a version of this where embedding was allowed, so you’ll have to bugger off to YouTube to see it.

P is for …

Ah, some proper candidates again. I’ve liked PWEI for some time, so they are the first band to put down a ‘marker’. Pantera I quite like (or at least some of their stuff), but crucially not as much, the same problem that P.I.L. and The Prodigy have.

I also like the Pet Shop Boys, and Placebo, and Public Enemy and Pulp. But I am instead going to pick another ‘classic’ band — The Police.

Q is for …

There can be only one. As they themselves said. Not only did they have a lot of great songs, but they also certainly knew how to make a pop video.

Freddie Mercury. Gone, but never forgotten.

R is for …

Well, this is another one where I thought there was only one real candidate — at least for me. And that was Rage Against The Machine. And then I started thinking of other ‘R’ bands I liked: R.E.M., Chris Rea, the Chillis, the Ministry-inspired Revolting Cocks, Right Said Fred, Roxy Music and the Rolling Stones.

Hmm. Okay then, a choice of two: the Rolling Stones or Rage Against The Machine. The Stones are more influential, cover a wider musical genre, lasted an awful lot longer, have had a bucket load more hits; Rage Against the Machine were more in your face, spitting out energy and venom, part of that sort of Rock/Rap crossover genre I like when done well, and few did it better than Rage.

And so even though I’ve often said if I could pick one band I like to be liked by my children, I’d pick the Stones — because they are musicians, because you can get from there to rock, to blues, to a lot of other things with quality music — I’m going to take advice from Zack de la Rocha, and “fight the war, fuck the norm”. So here’s RATM with ‘wake up’.

And S through to Z

…me dear daddy said, will be written on the street barricades. Or possibly included in a third post to follow at a later date.

Here’s your route to Top Of The Pops:

1. Go to “wikipedia.” Hit “random” or click http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random. The first random wikipedia article you get is the name of your band.
2. Go to “Random quotations” or click http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3. The last four or five words of the very last quote of the page is the title of your first album.
3. Go to flickr and click on “explore the last seven days” or click http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days. Third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover.

I had a problem with this last one, as I kept hitting ‘all rights reserved’. So if you encounter this, I have an alternative: go to Flickr advanced search, and search for any photo that was taken within the last week, where there is a creative commons licence that will allow you to adapt the work.

Credits:

• Anchisaurus: a sauropod dinosaur from the early Jurassic
• …by the corrupt few: George Bernard Shaw, the last few words of a quotation relating to democracy
• Photo: miss blackbutterfly on flickr.

A is for …

It boiled down to a choice of two: Adam or Anthrax. New Romantic or Skate Metal. While I think “Bring The Noise” takes a lot of beating (as does ‘Got The Time’), I’ve been forced to pick Adam and his Ants at this juncture, simply because he’s one of the first artists I remember seeing on television: I remember enjoying the song, although I have a sneaking suspicion that I kept singing one of the key lines as “stand on your liver…”.

Still, as the man himself said, “Ridicule is nothing to be scared of.”

B is for …

A classic band with a massive amount of influence. Much copied, much parodied. But some of those riffs defined the genre.

I will allow a slight variation of their own words to tell you who they are:

What is this, this band before me?
Begins with a ‘black’, has Tony Iommi

And if you can’t get it off of that, you need to widen your musical knowledge. Or at least read the title off the video.

C is for …

The man in black. Who else could it be? The legend that is Johnny Cash.

Johnny Cash was the man who — admittedly after he’d died — demonstrated to me that country songs could carry a certain power, and that they weren’t just songs with titles like “I Want A Beer As Cold As My Ex-Wife’s Heart” for everyone to take the piss out of.

That’s why we need a man in black.

D is for …

The band which got me ready for most of my nights out during my university days. When I wanted to get psyched up to go out on the beer, there was one song that would describe the manic state of mind I would get myself in. Even when I didn’t, and never was going to, end up in that sort of a state, Jello Biafra’s distinctive voice would be telling me “I went to a party…”.

The Dead Kennedys. That San Francisco hardcore punk band. The first band to reach the UK top 40 with a song which contained the word “fuck” in the title. Too Drunk To Fuck.

Unfortunately I couldn’t find a live performance of these, so instead here’s Holiday In Cambodia, showing Jello at his hyped up psyched up weirded out best.

E is for …

A somewhat different musical tone; sort of ballad-rock, sort of almost bluesy, sort of almost easy listening. Although I suspect they would probably be narked at being described as anything other than a rock band.

It’s a mellow sound, one I can imagine drifting off in, one I can easily imagine lying on a grassy hillside with my eyes closed and the sun beating down on my face, as the strains of “Takes It Easy” play on my internal radio.

E is, of course, for The Eagles.

F is for …

With F, I really struggled. I struggled to think of enough bands/singers beginning with F to make this a challenge worth actually thinking about. Beyond Frankie Goes To Hollywood, and Fun Boy Three, Faith No More, Foreigner and the Fine Young Cannibals. I was tempted to include Michael Franti here (off of Disposable Heroes of Hiphoprisy and Spearhead), but I felt that would have been cheating and he’d better go off and fight for the ‘S’ letter because he’d already lost out on ‘D’.

I could have just picked one of them at random, but that would have felt wrong, since we care a lot about this meme. I’d instead have to come up with some proper reason for picking a particular band. Was there something I disliked about some of the other bands — even something virtually buried in my subconscious? Well, I’d have to dig around in there. It’s a dirty job but someone has to do it.

Well, at the risk of making it sound like the lunatics have taken over the asylum, I’ll have to plump for the pop princes, Frankie Goes To Hollywood. Hits such as Relax, Two Tribes, and in particular The Power of Love are just as poptastic now as they ever were.

…although I was tempted to mark them down for the somewhat incomprehensible Spectrum computer game based on the band.

G is for …

There’s the obvious — Guns n’ Roses, starting us off with some hard rock sound. Despite quite liking ‘Radar Love’, I am not aware of anything else by Golden Earring, so they drop out. Gorrilaz are cool: in fact, tune-wise I prefer them to Albarn’s prior outfit, and having been a big fan of Hewligan’s Haircut, any venture including the artist Jamie Hewlett scores points in my book.

Unfortunately, these doesn’t really make them a better band than GnR, who would be clear favourites, if my personal dislike for Axl Rose was to be relaxed enough to allow them to win. As it isn’t — this is about who are my favourites as opposed to who I think are the best, I am instead going to have to go for a band who while being considerably less famous, less successful, and frankly less talented, have at least managed to make me laugh.

I am referring of course to those rappers who are Newport’s finest — you knows it, it’s the GLC. If by some chance you have heard of them, it might have been their satire on the American hip-hop controversy, entitled “Guns Don’t Kill People, Rappers Do”.

H is for …

Will it be Jimi? Will it be Hootie? Will it be the Human League?

Well, possibly, definitely not, and no respectively. This is one of the weaker categories, again owing to the fact that I couldn’t think of many bands beginning with H which were ever going to be contenders. In the end I went for House of Pain, as much for ‘Jump Around’ as anything else. Jump Around again defined my student days. Every rock club played it, pretty much every night. And you still hear it sampled regularly now.

Jimi Hendrix was obviously better and more talented, but House Of Pain defined that era for me. Plus I saw them play live in Newcastle*, during Keegan-as-manager era #1 and witnessed the amusing sight of the band being momentarily dumbfounded by a chant of “Toon Army” which sparked up from nowhere and lasted for about three minutes during the gig.

*although what with Jimi having died in 1970, it’s difficult to actually mark him down for not touring.

However, as everyone will have heard Jump Around, I am instead going to offer up “On Point”.

I is for …

• Run To The Hills
• Fear Of The Dark
• Can I Play With Madness
• Bring Your Daughter To The Slaughter

There could only be one hard rock icon filling the I spot, and that’s why one of my mates will no doubt be upset to discover that I’m not putting Iron Maiden in it. Great band, very much like them, but they don’t get the spot. Nor does a Rebel Yell and a White Wedding earn it for Mr. Idol. Instead, I’ll give the I award to one of the craggiest looking people in showbiz, Mr Barechest.

With his liquor and drugs. And what sounds like — but isn’t — a fax machine.

Iggy.

To Be Continued…

For J through to Z, there’s more needs to be said, but these will follow in a later post or posts.