So here we are, the final day of my Eighties Challenge, just time for one last trawl through the ocean of time to catch a shimmering fish of musical nostalgia.
With all the great music that was produced in the 1980s, and there was a lot, you didn't have to wait all that long for your new favourite band to make an appearance; turn on the radio, tune into Top Of The Pops on a Thursday night, listen to that cover-mounted cassette, there they were. Once discovered there was the inevitable period of new fandom, that golden time spent buying the single and listening to it over and over again. Of course, being a fickle minded youth, my allegiances to bands would wax and wane depending on the views of Smash Hits or the NME, hearing the appalling follow up single to the big hit, or just good old-fashioned peer pressure. Of all the bands I discovered back in the Eighties there a handful that I still regularly listen to, and today's band is one of them.
They weren't cool. They weren't hip. They weren't trendy. They didn't produce music that you could easily dance to or soundtrack car chases with but they had a good ear for melody and a nose for interesting and well-crafted lyrics. They let the drummer write the odd song and the bass player painted their album covers. They came from a land down under but were more interested in chocolate cake than Vegemite. They were Crowded House.
Now I know what some of you might be thinking; a guy like me who listens to bands that no-one else has heard of (let alone could be dragged along to see with me) must be having a laugh. I assure you I'm not. Crowded House? Really? Yes, really, and no I won't try and shrug off my appreciation of Neil Finn and chums as a guilty pleasure. I like listening to them and I'm not guilty about it. So there. I've still got their albums (I bought the debut in the Television Parlour shop in Fareham), a lot of the singles (I've even got the little cardboard box that collects the releases from Woodface) and even the odd live bootleg. For all my love of Krautrock, of Electronica, of noodly Indie guitar bands, of odd Modern Jazz from Scandinavia, I like Crowded House too. What can I say, I have catholic tastes.
And so I finish my seven days roaming the Eighties with one of my favourite Crowded House songs, taken from their under-rated second album, Temple Of Low Men (which is apparently a very rude album name indeed); here, from 1988, is Better Be Home Soon..
With all the great music that was produced in the 1980s, and there was a lot, you didn't have to wait all that long for your new favourite band to make an appearance; turn on the radio, tune into Top Of The Pops on a Thursday night, listen to that cover-mounted cassette, there they were. Once discovered there was the inevitable period of new fandom, that golden time spent buying the single and listening to it over and over again. Of course, being a fickle minded youth, my allegiances to bands would wax and wane depending on the views of Smash Hits or the NME, hearing the appalling follow up single to the big hit, or just good old-fashioned peer pressure. Of all the bands I discovered back in the Eighties there a handful that I still regularly listen to, and today's band is one of them.
They weren't cool. They weren't hip. They weren't trendy. They didn't produce music that you could easily dance to or soundtrack car chases with but they had a good ear for melody and a nose for interesting and well-crafted lyrics. They let the drummer write the odd song and the bass player painted their album covers. They came from a land down under but were more interested in chocolate cake than Vegemite. They were Crowded House.
Now I know what some of you might be thinking; a guy like me who listens to bands that no-one else has heard of (let alone could be dragged along to see with me) must be having a laugh. I assure you I'm not. Crowded House? Really? Yes, really, and no I won't try and shrug off my appreciation of Neil Finn and chums as a guilty pleasure. I like listening to them and I'm not guilty about it. So there. I've still got their albums (I bought the debut in the Television Parlour shop in Fareham), a lot of the singles (I've even got the little cardboard box that collects the releases from Woodface) and even the odd live bootleg. For all my love of Krautrock, of Electronica, of noodly Indie guitar bands, of odd Modern Jazz from Scandinavia, I like Crowded House too. What can I say, I have catholic tastes.
And so I finish my seven days roaming the Eighties with one of my favourite Crowded House songs, taken from their under-rated second album, Temple Of Low Men (which is apparently a very rude album name indeed); here, from 1988, is Better Be Home Soon..
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