Entertainment For Lively Minds
The best Fab-esque record ever?
Posted by DougieJ on 18 June 2011 - 11:49am.
Yes Roland Orzabal could be a bit 'up himself', but by Christ did he write an absolute belter with this one. It's got the lot - I Am The Walrus chugging keyboards, middle eight, Penny Lane horns, epic chorus...
Would even go so far as to say it's as good as anything the actual Beatles did. Certainly it's one that Noel G would have killed to write.
Disappeared off the radar a bit now have TFF, but they were deservedly huge back in the Nineteen E******s. Some cracking tunes, and Curt Smith had a very decent voice.
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Lies...
...by the Knickerbockers.
Superb!
Thanks for that - hadn't heard this one before; utter fabness.
It's alright.
I agree that Roland Horsesballs did write some good tunes.
I just think that this was such an obvious pastiche that you can't help but notice the joins. I'm not sure if one can say that is it as good as The Fabs... Standing on the shoulders of giants, and all that.
I liked the 'Songs From The Big Chair' era better.
It *is* an obvious pastiche, yes.
but none the worse for that, imo. We'll have to A to D on this one. I thought it was spectacularly well done.
Fair do's Dougie...
*smiley thing*
for me, it's the drums that make it...
If you're going to do a pastiche, you have to pay attention to the small things, and in this, the drums are just as 'floppy' as Ringo used to do.
I've long had a soft spot for this as well...Yer man from the Fountains of Wayne gets a few quid from Tom Hanks and comes up with this...
Know what you mean re: the accuracy of the 'floppy' drums.
Ticket to Ride and Rain in particular.
Talking about great drums, sticksman nonpareil Phil Collins played on this...
Curt Smith
Curt smith - Psych
From about 1.30 in. Psych's a well written little gem with some terrific pop culture references.
That week? Curt Smith. Probably not up himself.
What ruined the film for me
was how the lead singer talked as though he smoked 150 Marlboros a day, but sang like Davy Jones with his balls in a vice. I assume the actor wasn't singing on the soundtrack (or, less likely, all of his dialogue was looped by another actor.)
Not a bad song, though, although it did grate after hearing it for the umpteenth time in 90 minutes. (The band would never have made it - they only had one-and-a-half songs.)
eh?
I thought the Tears for Fears record was an affectionate tribute to the Prefab Four
I Had A TFF Moment Last Week
posted about six or seven of their best songs on facebook I loved their first three albums there were some gems on those albums,Sowing The Seeds Of Love, great track also love Start Of The Breakdown,Memories Fade,I Believe,The Working Hour, Head Over Heels/Broken, Advice For the Young At Heart and the other obvious hits like Mad World and Pale Shelter.
there's even some good stuff post Smith
"Break It Down Again" is a belter.
You can't fault the first two albums and "Seeds Of Love" has some great moments too.
Yes I can fault them...
Totally up their own fundament. Completely lacking in anything remotely interesting.
In defence of pretentiousness...
Some might say there was a certain inconsistency in your two statements Jim. 'Totally up their own fundament' I completely accept and I in fact mentioned this in my OP. But to then say 'completely lacking in anything remotely interesting' seems strange to me.
In today's pop landscape, utterly dominated as it is by the narcissism, relentless sexual imagery and shallow materialism of Arr and Bee (not remotely interesting to me), I for one yearn for the fertile imagination, occasional daftness and, yes, pretension of the '80s.
Another one sans Curt...
Todd Rundgren/Utopia's I Just Want To Touch You
not seen that before,
what's the story behind it?
Well...
...it's from a Utopia album called Deface The Music which is an album of Todd doing The HJH. Unfortunately, it's not on Spotify, Amazon only have it available as a download, or 39.97 on import. It's a great companion to The Rutles.
According to Wikipedia, I Just Want To Touch You was written for the film Roadie but rejected by the producers for fear of legal action.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Deface-Music-Utopia/dp/B0000032PF/ref=sr_1_1?ie...
Don't know much about Todd,
but if he'd only ever done this, that would do for me:
Magic pop song.
I'm assuming his Fabs pastiche was affectionate? Brilliantly done anyway.
Affectionate? No doubt whatsoever
Strawberry Fields Forever & Rain from Faithful.
Pretty good versions.
'Rain' - could've been released last week, but it was in fact in Nineteen Sodding Sixty Six ffs. A perfect union of four (yes four, not two or three) individuals at the absolute peak of their creativity...
Staggering.
This is...
...the tune I was going to choose. Superb stuff.
Yeah yeah, whatever
How about The Worst Fab-esque record ever?
Good lord
That's dreadful.
Lay Down Your Love - October Cherries
Hooray For Tuesday - The Minders
Two of my favourites.
Sounds more like
The Move to me, but thanks for two brand new songs !
Hooray for Tuesday
I hate Tuesdays... but that's a fantastic song! Thanks (belatedly) for reminding me of it.
Hooray indeed!
What a fantastic record - you obviously know your Beatlestuff, Happy Person!
World Party
Put the message in the box -
and they can pull it off live too.......
Karl is pretty good as ver Beach Boys too
hidden track on original CDs of 'Bang'. Not sure if its on the reissues
"We dropped all our bombs with certain precision
I think we put an end to female circumcision"
Pretty Little Star - Key
From a truly wonderful LP from 1978, 'Fit Me In', recently re-issued by Rev-Ola. The bonus tracks do not disappoint :-).
Ian McNabb
Like a late Fabs Lennon number with Neil guesting on lead:
Sack those boring megastars, Mister Eavis, and get this guy in to shake the Pyramid.
Epic, euphoric pop tune.
always loved it.
more mcnabb
Beatles meet Beach Boys. Class. Turning into a McNabb love in at the moment isn't it?
Love him
He is such a nice bloke too.
I once accompanied him on an acoustic version of 'Who Do You Want For Your Love?' at my friend's house, you know!
Beau Brummels "Laugh Laugh"
Possibly more McCartney-esque....
Dr Dog: The World May Never Know
Great group from the late 90s
The Real People
Window Pane
More TFF fab-ness
TFF reformed in 2004 and are doing more Beatles-esque stuff:
Closest thing to Heaven
Why has no-one mentioned Andy Partridge?
You can make a case for quite a lot of the works of the Dukes of Stratosphear...
Well, this is certainly the toppermost of the poppermost
AFAIC:
Possibly the most unfeasibly uplifting strummingness in all of popular music at 0.39 imho...
Surprise, surprise
I adore Tears for Fears and STSOL is up there with "Pale Shelter", "Mad World" and "Shout" and all the others, just great pop songs. *Goes to get ipod for TFF session*
Fab-esque songs? On Del Amitris "Some Other Suckers Parade" the last song is called "Make it Always Be Too Late" and I always thought there was Beatles feel to it, this is a live version but the recorded version is worth looking out for on Spotify if you have it.
And this ridiculously exciting pop nugget...
I love this song and 22
I love this song and 22 years later it is still in heavy rotation in the eddie house.
I remember Mark Goodier playing it for the first time on his Radio 1 Evening Session show in the summer of 1989 and getting so giddy about the song that he played it all over again.
I miss Mark Goodier.
Mark Goodier -
I always liked him as well. I even remember him when he was on Radio Clyde in Glasgow before he went to that London...
From the unsettling Fabs era...
Can't put my finger on the exact influence. Sexy Sadie? Great track anyway.
oh good...
there's somebody else who likes this!
that's brilliant
so I'm going to buy it. Sounds like solo Lennon to me, Wall and Bridges era. Fantastic song
Glad to see others
have recognised the brilliance of STSOL. I was beginning to think I'd been guilty of hyperbole (as if!).
Colours
Hugely recommended to Beatle heads
http://psychedelic-rocknroll.blogspot.com/2009/02/colours-colours-psyche...
And yes, Sowing The Seeds Of Love is a masterpiece.
Klaatu barada nikto
Very Macca-like isn't it?
as is another that's featured on the same excellent compilation Burning Sounds - 20 Killer Power Pop Cuts!
(The Raspberries - Overnight Sensation)
1982
Release by Scarlet Party called 101 Damnations. Beatlesque and then some
Was released on the reactivated Parlophone label, recorded at Abbey Road and featured the same organ that John played on the HJH's We Can Work It Out.
Oh yes.
I remember listening to it on, get this, Radio Luxembourg!* In classic style - under the bedcovers, on an AM tranny, reception fading in and out...
*anyone else remember the ads in the early 80s for Cuticura talc? Seemed like their only sponsor...
C H E E S E A N D O N I O N S
There's several songs by the Rut's that are just better than the fabs
And on zero budget too.
Fab-esque Nirvana
About a Girl
This
Psychedelic clichés
I don't know about psychedelic era Fab-esqueness - hasn't that been overdone, already to excess in the sixties let alone since - ad nauseum, most recently by Oasis with All Around The World and Who Feels Love among others. Enough already!
This sounds like a cross between Penny Lane & Rain
Eric Matthews-Fanfare
And, similarly Mark Radcliffe played it twice in succession on Radio 1 saying "that's so good I'm going to play it again"
very good shout !
I used to have this - what year was it. Certainly haven't heard it for a while and always loved the pop pedigree...and what happened to Eric ??
Pretty sure it was '95
I think he does a lot of production and the odd album-still signed to Subpop.
The Second Summer of Love
DW mentioned on the blog by the Massive earlier today elsewhere, this was pretty much better than anything released in the first summer of love. Something Lennon would have tossed for Ringo to sing around the time of Rubber Soul/Revolver...
XTC Mayor Of Simpleton
If there was any justice
this would have been number 1 longer than Bryan Adams-didn't even make the top 40.
Were the words criminally ignored invented just for the mighty XTC
hear hear ...
i always thought this track and "king for a day" from oranges and lemons, were absolute corkers
It occurred to me
that this is Andy P's take on Wonderful World by Sam Cooke.
SAM:COOKE
Don't know much about history,
Don't know much about biology
Don't know much about a science book
Don't know much much about the French I took.
But I do know that I love you
And I know that if you love me too
What a wonderful world this would be.
ANDY PARTRIDGE
I've never been near a university
Never took a paper or a learned degree
And some of your friends think that's stupid of me
But it's nothing that I care about
Well I don't know how to tell the weight of the sun
And of mathematics, I want none
And I may be the mayor of simpleton
But I know one thing
Is that I love you
Emitt Rhodes
Someone on here put me on to Emitt Rhodes a couple of years ago. Wonderful stuff, and very Fab-esque, with a definite lean towards the McCartney.
er....does this count?
George Harrison - When We Was Fab....
Julian Cope, in "Head On"...
... poured scorn on TFF for being the band his label signed to replace The Teardrop Explodes, as they were (paraphrasing) Teardrop Explodes obsessives, but nice boys from Bath as opposed to acid-fried loons from Liverpool.
I love the albums "Songs From the Big Chair" (tends to be looked down on as the home of the ubiquitous "Everybody Wants To Rule The World", but it's terrific) and "Sowing The Seeds Of Love"... and was the story about them discovering Oleta Adams singing at an airport bar and offering her a place in the band on the spot true, or just PR?
My 2d worth...Eleven - Learning To Be
but I endorse all the above, especially Crowded House and Todd Rundgren. Jellyfish ?
Crowded House - never be the same
listen to the backing at 3.03 - it's uncannily fab-esque.
do yourselves a favour
and listen to Jellyfishs' 1st album.Sublime.
Second album
"Spilt Milk" - also rather nifty
The Changingman ..by..
..sorry ELO
To be fair to ver Modfather,
with the Changingman and Start!, obvious rip-offs (rips-off?) of 10538 Overture and Taxman respectively, he took the basic riff and made something quite different out of it for the final record. Also, I guess he would make the case that many of the sixties bands he loved recycled existing blues riffs to highly lucrative ends, so he was merely following in those footsteps.
However, he has yet to face the litmus test, i.e. how would he feel when another band steals/pays homage to/borrows/recycles one of his own riffs?
To be fair Dougie..
..I quite like Changingman (arguably a better song than ELO's) and that guitar figure is almost a cliche in itself (See also "Dear Prudence", "Sweet Home Alabama" "Needle and the Damage Done" "Something In The Air"..all slightly different, but all using that same basic guitar move)
Aerovons World of You
These were some American chaps who managed to get a recording gig at Abbey Road, but never released the album. Join the debate as to whether this is late Beatles sounding or too orchestral for that.
No, really…
Cotton Mather
Not sure, as I can't view (or add) clips at work, but has anyone mentioned "40 Watt Solution" by Cotton Mather? One of the Fabbest of Fabbesque records. In my own private, alternative universe, it's been number 1 for the last 3 years or so...
The Lonely Boys - Flowers On The Moon
(Fictional Swedish band, only existing on a book soundtrack)
Earnest of Being George - Bee Gees
man.of.soup may be familiar :-)
He is
... and thanks for posting that! I've been listening to it recently.
What a brilliant thread
I've discovered some real gems here. Thanks Massive.
King Crimson..
..perform an outtake from Abbey Road.
(with extra sexism and widdling)