An Eighties Challenge, Day Seven

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..

An Eighties Challenge, Day Five

The fifth day of the Eighties Challenge I've been set, a selection of seven hand-picked tunes from that fine decade, gently buffed to a shine and hot-glued onto the web.

Whilst some bands had the legs to make it through the decade, more or less intact, not all were so lucky. Wikipedia has a handy selection of 'year in music' pages that list the hits but also the casualties, the bands that either disbanded or imploded. Such is the way of things not all of these bands stayed dead, they festered for awhile, sometimes feuded publicly, then reformed, with more or less the original line-up, usually for financial reasons. If this sounds cynical then, well, that's the music business for you.

Today's band have split, reformed, split again, reformed again, had members sacked, replaced, re-hired and sacked again. Back in the mid-eighties they looked like a bunch of fashion models and public school boys, which they possibly were, who wore cricket jumpers and blazers. The lead singer not only helped co-produce their debut album but was also credited on the liner notes for art direction and styling of the sleeve. They covered Roxy Music, they had the Artists Against Apartheid logo printed on their releases, they were terribly right on. They released a string of singles that had some success, one featuring the dulcet tones of Belinda Carlisle, whilst their biggest hit was used on the soundtrack for a dystopian sci-fi film that starred Mark Hamill (and flopped so badly at the cinema that the producer went bankrupt). Today's band is, of course, Then Jerico.

I toyed with picking Big Area, the big hit from the bad movie, but that would perhaps have been a wee bit too obvious a choice (plus I couldn't find the promo with clips of Mark Hamill and Bob Peck in an Edgley Optica on YouTube, maybe I just imagined seeing that on Top Of The Pops). Instead I've plumped for The Motive, a track from their debut album, 'First (The Sound of Music)', the LP of which I still have. The video ticks a lot of Eighties boxes, with back projected footage, slow motion and moving camera shots, with the added bonus of lead singer posing. Lovely.

Some years after their big success I got see to Then Jerico up close and personal at The Wedgewood Rooms (though they were billed as Then Jerico II and were basically a vehicle for lead singer Mark Shaw to belt out the hits, aided on stage by the silent, brooding and be-jacketed figure of Andy Taylor). Yes, that Andy Taylor, him from Duran Duran and The Power Station. Andy Taylor who noodled away on his guitar whilst simultaneously puffing away on a home-made cigarette of some description. Come to think of it I think I've got the set-list here somewhere. err.. but I digress. Here then, from 1987, is The Motive.. the nights come down and moments glow, the rats go by and by...

The Gigwatcher 21/06/2006

"Willkommen zu Gigwatcher", as Pele might say if he was on my mailing list.

The shenanigans in Germany roll on, though now without Ickle Michael Owen who crocked himself a treat last night (having popped my knee a couple of times I know much it hurts). If the sight of the wee man crawling off the pitch wasn't bad enough I then found out that the BBC had cancelled Top of the Pops. So much for Tuesday; Wednesday brought forth a strange quorn and lemon mayo concoction in the canteen (interesting) and, of course, the NME:

Four Day Hombre @ The Joiners, Southampton - 14/07/2006
Howling Bells @ @ The Joiners, Southampton - 22/07/2006
Seafood @ The Joiners, Southampton - 29/07/2006
Keane @ Brighton Centre, Brighton - 25/10/2006

I'll add the above onto the Son of Music Club's Events Calendar. There they'll join all the other gigs I stumble across on my forays across the interweb, for example:

Dlugokecki @ The Soul Cellar, Southampton - 23/06/2006 (an acoustic set from the "as heard on Hollyoaks" local singer/songwriter)
Scritti Politti @ The Wedgewood Rooms, Portsmouth - 10/07/2006
John Otway & Wild Willy Barrett @ Salisbury Arts Centre, Salisbury - 20/07/2006 (the tickets aren't really free. ahem)
Sandi Thom @ The Wedgewood Rooms, Portsmouth - 19/10/2006

I've also added in details of the Tin Hut Music Festival, which takes place in Stroud (near Petersfield) on the 15th of July. There's a mixed line-up of local(ish) acts taking part, the event itself being held to raise money for the Stroud Village Hall Rebuilding Fund. If you'd like to peruse the Events Calendar for more information on the Tin Hut festival (or any of the other) gigs then just aim your browser to the forum and log in (there's bound to be something in there that tickles your fancy).

On the forum there's a link to some quite dodgy 80's music videos and, following the news of TOTP's demise, I revisited Poet's Corner. Oh dear.

And that's it for this week..