Entertainment For Lively Minds
The song I hate by a group I really love
Occasionally when I listen to an album I really like I have to press FF (or whatever you press these days - you may even lift the arm still) when THAT song starts. It´s the songs I can´t stand on albums by groups I really like.
There are the obvious ones. Maxwell´s Sliver Hammer comes to mind by the HJH, but it´s not considered one of their greats, is it?
But if we move on to the W section we find that Squeeze Box by The Who appears to have found it´s way to most of their compilations. It´s awful. And I´m a fan of The Who By Numbers, on which it is the most famous song.
So I´m not talking about "not so keen on this one", I´m talking about the songs that make you cringe.
Oh, I would also like to nominate Old King by Neil Young. Apart from that, Harvest Moon is a favourite. Had it been on Landing On Water I would have accepted it, but giving Harvest Moon a limp? Bad dog!
Other suggestions?
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The Crunge
Led Zeppelin, Houses of the Holy. Unlistenable.
Over-familiarity
Two which I have real difficulty listening to now are:
Bohemain Rhapsody (Queen) and Imagine (Lennon)
An absolutely cringe-worthy experience (ie this has no place here, its awful!) is 'Closed Groove' on the end of Stiff Little Fingers' Inflammable Material
There's loads of tracks that I'm not bothered about, and will happily skip (eg Trans-Global Express (Jam)) if I can
Yes.
Imagine really is shite, isn't it. See also Woman, Instant Karma, (Just Like) Starting Over, most of Lennon's post 1970 output...etc...etc
Ba, ba, ba, ba, ba, ba,
ba, ba, baa, baaaa? Surely one of Mr Wellers finest moments?
Squeeze Box
What I found most annoying about that song was the disingenuous defence of it by Townshend, which went along the lines of "Everybody thinks it's a rude song, but it's about a woman who plays an accordion". Because there was of course nothing whatsoever in the lyrics that could be construed as a double entendre.
'Losing My Religion', never liked from first time I heard it
'The Sidewinder Sleeps Tonight's annoying too... Really not mad on 'Man on The Moon' either..
And yet I love REM, 'Out Of Time' and 'Automatic For The People'.
I've said it before and I'll say it again...
Student Demonstration Time off of Surf's Up really grates.
I HATE Mike LOVE.
...and you are right
It's an awful racket.
I hope I have made clear in previous postings that I love Joni Mitchell, but I confess I have skipped past The Jungle Line from The Hissing of Summer Lawns on more than one occasion. So shoot me.
No shooting required...
..it's a poor song on a great album.
How could I forget that one when I came up with the thread?
Maybe because I deleted the bloody thing when I made a Surf´s Up copy for my car AND when I loaded my MP3 player. That twofer with Sunflower is amazing. Which reminds me of At My Window, even if I left that on.
...that's mental!!!
Jungle Line is a classic - years ahead of it time and it adds another dimension to an already perfect album...(I've got a friend who dislikes this song but he doesn't like "Strawberry Fields" either so it must be fear of innovation.
Fifthed
Surf's Up would be alot better
if Student Demomstration Time and Take a Load Off Your Feet had been replaced by a longer mix of Til I Die and Dennis' Fourth of July.
I actually like Squeeze Box by the Who but the song by them I can't stand is Doctor Doctor. John usually wrote such great songs, Doctor Doctor sounds like a corny knockoff of Mother's Little Helper to me. John's irritating falsetto vocals don't help either.
Blur
I hate 'This is a low'. Lauded as the big end of show anthem. They did so much other stuff that was so much better.
...you what...
..surely the best thing Blur have ever done!!!
HERESY! ;-)
Blur are one of my very favourite bands. And personally, I love "This is a Low".
But I can't even slightly bear to listen to "The Universal".
I find that rather bizarre
It's the likes of "Country House" and "Charmless Man" that get the skippage on that album.
Fair enough
Both tracks I skip too. The Great Escape is my least favourite Blur album, granted.
But even they just don't annoy me as much as "The Universal" does. There's something about it that actually sets my teeth on edge, to the extent that when a British Gas ad comes on the TV or radio, I have to turn over.
Hey, I never claimed to be rational...
I Think I Smell A Rat
The White Stripes.
Can't stand it.
English Rose
by The Jam is terrible. Terrible.
What...?!
Any song that features the line "and no bonds shall ever tempt me from she" deserves constant rotation.
That is precisely the line
that raises it to a whole other level of Terrible.
Wellerman comin' over all Poe'ic like - just don't need it - kno' wot I mean?
Agreed
That line clunks mightily.
I think
Retro is being ironic. Aren't you?
But of course...
can't we have a "smiley" amnesty..?
thought so Retro
- but you can't be too careful. I loves me some Jam - and so "English Rose" shouldn't be tossed aside lightly - it should be hurled aside with great force - as the Dorothy Parker line runs. Or was it Plath? Or Wilde? Or Dr Johnson? Noddy Holder?
Incidentally, Irony-meters seem on low-wattage at mo. As someone who's smiley-averse this is a worrying trend. Noted a kerfuffle over unread irony on anuvver fred.
It's quite often Fall fans - somewhat ironically given how clever and witty and iconoclastic Mark E Smith is - wot don't get the joke I find.
I don't want to turn up at
the next get-together to find everyone pointing at me and sniggering that here comes the guy who thinks English Rose is a great lyrical masterpiece. So, yes, I must be careful with the irony, flippancy and mickey taking from now on!
..didn't Mr Weller..
..briefly look into a career as a poet following the break-up of the Jam?
I was listening to All Mod Cons
in the car today and it reminded me of another poor bit of rhyming from Mr. Weller...it's in one of my favourite tracks "To Be Someone" and the way he says "call" to sound like "cool" always bugged me! The line goes "No more swimming in a guitar shaped pool, no more reporters at my beck and cool". Oh dear...
Oh
It's 'bonds' is it? I thought it said 'bums'.
Neil Hannon
is, IMHO, one of the best singer-songwriters working today, he and his songs have wit, charm, warmth, heartache, and tremendous charisma.
But he also wrote that ****ing song about coaches, the most ill-judged puddle of cheesy Europuke this side of Bucks Fizz. So of course it's by far his most well-known song.
Secondly, as a Ben Folds fan it's also my misfortune to find *his* biggest hit - Brick - a dull, monotonous, maudlin trudge of a song. Grr.
yes yes yes and yes
(although "My Lovely Horse" forgives a thousand "National Express"es)
Good call on Brick...
I remember years ago, Simon Mayo announcing a reader's request for a Ben Folds track on Radio One. I was thrilled, until I heard the opening strains of "Boxing". I mean, I really love the song, but it's not a crowd pleaser. I could just imagine a million Radio-One-listening minds instantly closing towards Mr Folds forever. Indeed, Mayo himself canned the track about halfway through as he couldn't bear it any more.
Black Eyed Dog by Nick Drake
...because it's so unsettling and depressing. You can hear in Drake's shell of a voice that the poor guy has given up on life and knows his end is near.
Everybody Hurts
and Man On The Moon by R.E.M. - maybe it's the over familiarity or the fact that I have seen them murdered at many a karaoke bar over the years.
I'm not a fan of the self-conscious lighter waving "anthem", Blur, U2, Oasis, R.E.M. are all guilty of this.
Lots of Beatles and Lennon songs really set my teeth on edge, Let It Be, All You Need Is Love, Imagine, Hey Jude - unlistenable!
While My Guitar...
... just a dirge - so musically uninteresting that even Macca and Lennon didn't know what to do with it. George brought Clapton in to try and spice it up it (which he fails to do). Good title - that's about all.
Have you heard the stripped down version
from the Love album? It's mathematically proven to be a thousand times better than the original.
Old King
Exceptionally good call. Yet somehow it is not Harvest Moon without that song there.
I don´t mean to give Neil a hard time
but I was listening to Silver & Gold today and it dawned on me that he did the same thing - and basically wrote the same song - with Daddy Went Walking.
That Kate Bush song about eating fruit..
..from the below par Red Shoes album. And also the other one which has Lenny Henry and Prince on backing vocals (no joke)..
Why Should I Love You?
I think that's a great track, all the more so for knowing one of the vocalists might be singing it to Dawn French.
Shiny Happy People.
Not exactly a grower-more of a shrinker, really.
The Smiths
I have always found that despite absolutely loving the band, there is always at least one song on each album that I really dislike (with the exception of the debut!);
Album/Track
The Queen Is Dead / Never Had No One Ever
Strangeways, Here We Come / I Won't Share You
Louder Than Bombs / Golden Lights
Meat is Murder / Meat is Murder
Debaser by Pixies
Lovelovelove the band. But a combination of indie disco overkill and something else I can't quite figure out, means this always leaves me cold. The Dame's cover didn't help matters either.
Electric Ladyland..
Hendrix so pleasant/stoned, he just had to let weedy-voice Redding do a number on the album, the execrable and unlistenable Little Miss Strange.
and off John Cale & Terry Riley's otherwise great Church of Anthrax, The Soul of Patrick Lee is torture.
Okay I'm Not A Massive Queen fan...
...but if I occasionally find myself listening to one of their 70s LPs then the ones that Roger Taylor sings invariably get skipped ("Drowse" excepted)... just terrible
Anyone remember Ooberman?
Sort of like a Scouse Kids' TV version of the Super Furry Animals. Talented bunch, and much of what they did is still rather close to my heart, but some of it was pish, such as the excreble Sugar Bum. No footage of it seems to exist on YouTube, which is rather a blessing. Have some Lord Kitch instead. Much better.
Massive Attack, Blue Lines, track 1..
not sure why they had the cheek to take Billy Cobham's mighty Quadrant 4 riff and fuck on it, but that's what it amounts to. Only gave him a quarter of the credit too.
If this is "sampling", maybe someone can explain how it's supposed to work. Never quite understood sampling, I must admit.