Remembrance Wednesday: The Tamperer ft. Maya – Feel It

There are many songs within the genre of pop that toe the line between excellent and completely terrible and unfortunately many of these eventually fade away and are forgotten by almost everyone. Except me, usually. I become increasingly aware of this when I’ve had a few ales and request one of these songs to a DJ in a club, and he hasn’t got it any more as he had to make room for the 30 new David Guetta tracks that came out in the past year.

Once I’ve got home and sobered up a bit, I find one of these songs I’ve been mourning and finally listen to it again to try and work out if it’s as good as I thought it was last night. This happened recently with ‘Feel It’ by The Tamperer ft. Maya, forgotten Italian three-hit wonders of the 90’s. Yes, three: Material Girl sampling and excellently titled but misleading ‘If You Buy This Record Your Life Will Be Better’, and Gimme Gimme Gimme sampling ‘Hammer To the Heart’ soon followed. I wonder if anyone did any research into the former and investigated the life-enhancing effects? I bet they were minimal.

‘Feel It’ was based on a not very subtle sample of The Jacksons’ ‘Can You Feel It’ and I think that’s where most of the joy lies, all except one very obvious part. The lyrics recount the tale of a woman’s adulterous lover making an amorous misstep but she forgives him, only for the other woman to get a bit clingy. Obviously nobody cares about that part and they’re only interested in the classic line:

“What’s she gonna look like with a chimney on her?”

That line is one of the lyrical beauties of the nineties, lodged into the brains of many people who are unable to recall its origin.  Poor Tamperer. My discussions with DJs usually go something like…
“Can you play that song by The Tamperer ft. Maya?”, ‘What’s that?’, “You know, the one about the woman with a chimney stuck on her head?” ‘Oh yeah! I remember. No’. I couldn’t help having a little web search for the line to see if there was some kind of meaning behind it, rather than the writer just looking at a chimney and thinking ‘that would look great on someone’s head’.

I saw that many before me had searched for the term and there were a few explanations. There was the one that I had accepted to be the original meaning, that ‘chimney’ was slang for a black eye. I’d never heard that term, certainly no one uses it where I’m from. Maybe it is like when someone looks through a comedy telescope on TV and gets a black circle around their eye, but with a chimney and a sooty circle instead? Whatever the case, this explanation made sense with the preceding line:

“I think she crossed the line / and I’m ready for the ride / I’m ready if it’s fighting time”

This disturbed me somewhat, especially as the woman, presumably ‘Maya’, in the video looks like she wouldn’t hesitate to smack someone”. However, then in some dark corner of the internet I came across this interview and an accompanying video which claim that the lyrics AND vocals were stolen from an underground dance song called ‘Drop A House’ by Urban Discharge (nice), which came out several years earlier.

Wikipedia says nothing about this sampling, only noting the Jacksons sample, but the interview makes for fairly interesting reading. I don’t want to get involved in the legal side of things (neither does The Tamperer, apparently), but the line “Wanna drop a house on that b****” does give a plausible origin of the chimney that could find itself upon a woman’s person.

Whatever the real origin and meaning of the lyrics, I’ll try to forget all that and just imagine that she is trying to put her fellow off the other woman by making him imagine how silly she would look embellished with rooftop paraphernalia. I’ll just enjoy the song for what it is, a piece of nineties nonsense, best enjoyed drunk. I don’t think pop music should condone violence and I certainly prefer my pop stars to look like this.

REVIEW: Amanda Palmer & The Grand Theft Orchestra – “Theatre is Evil”

Amanda Palmer & The Grand Theft Orchestra – “Theatre is Evil”

A review and general ramblings about my history with Palmer.

Like the majority of fans, I first came across Amanda Palmer when she was with Dresden Dolls. I was about seventeen and had befriended a girl on a music festival forum and met up with her at the festival in 2006. It was nothing seedy, I’m still in touch with her now and do my best to see her when we are both at the festival in the same year. One year on the forum somebody organised a mixtape swap and I was paired up with this girl.

I have no idea what was on my CD that I sent to her, probably tracks by bands that were ‘cool’ at the time, so I could impress her, plus a few of the weird little indie bands that I used to support continuously despite the fact they were pretty awful. There was this one band I loved, the man would badly play a guitar while the woman banged a toy keyboard and screamed over the top about Sherlock Holmes. I bought their album and t-shirt and dragged my friends to their concerts, then I was shocked when the local HMV did not stock their album, and I demanded they order it in. It was at one of their gigs that I first saw an instrument that I have always dreamed of, but I’ll come to that later.

I can’t remember what embarrassing stuff was on my CD, but on her CD was a track called ‘Gravity’ by Dresden Dolls. I had listened to the CD a couple of times and most of it was far too cool for me, but the Dresden Dolls track really caught my attention. This may have been because it only featured piano and drums with some mad banshee singing, talking, whispering then screaming I THINK WE’VE LOST HIM!

In the age where I was penniless and discovering independent music, I downloaded all of their albums, their B-sides and rarities album and then finally Amanda Palmer’s fantastic debut solo album. I tried to get some friend into this music and they did really take to the mildly offensive ‘Oasis’ video, with its rape-LOL and coat hanger abortion scene, but they didn’t want to adventure any further into Palmer’s disturbing mind.

A bit more time passed, I went to live in Spain for a year and had an Australian flatmate who loved Palmer and the B-52’s and many of my favourite acts but it was at last nice to find another fan. Palmer seems to have acquired a very strong Australian fanbase, touring there extensively and releasing an album of dodgy live recordings, ‘Amanda Palmer Goes Down Under’,  solely aimed at Australians and including the disturbing ode to pubic hair, ‘Map of Tasmania’. This wasn’t the follow up album I had been hoping for and I didn’t understand many of the references; of course, I could grasp that a lady’s garden looks like the outline of Tasmania but I could hardly sing along to an old  Vegemite advert like the audience in the recording.

Eventually, with a huge amount of money raised through a Kickstarter campaign, Palmer funded a new album and allowed me to purchase it through her website for the princely sum of one dollar. I’m not sure how much that is in GBP these days and I haven’t checked my bank statement since then, in case she took £100, but this presumably low cost was much appreciated as I am ‘between jobs’ and Palmer must be loaded. I listened to the album a few times and it didn’t really click with me until this week, when I was in the car for a mammoth journey and was able to listen to all nineteen tracks in one go, in the dark. It started to make sense after this.

Every album of Amanda Palmer’s has some tracks that are excellent and some that I would skip or never listen to until the end and there is nothing new with Theatre is Evil. With its nineteen tracks, including some bonus tracks I received because I paid as much as a US dollar, it is long enough to cut down into your own album, which I will probably do in the end. I intended to do a track-by-track review but that would take far too long, so I’ll pick out a few highlights.

                One of the first tracks I heard, ‘Do It With a Rockstar’ , which was a free download before the album was released, really hit me hard and made me reassess my social life. I kind of wish I had heard it before I went to university. Especially so, the lyric:

 “Do you wanna go back home, check your messages and charge your phone? Are you really sure you want to go when you can do it with a rock star?”

                After hearing that, I acknowledged that I am often one of the first to leave things and too eager to get to bed, which results in me missing out on something far better. I have been aware of this since I was about four and I was at a fair with my family. My great-grandmother bought us all some banana-shaped sweets, which she said we could have when we got home, so I went home early just so I could eat the sweets. During the time I was at home eating sweets I was going to get anyway, my siblings were having loads of fun on, possibly monkey-themed rides. I’m not sure if the rides were monkey related, I might just be associating them with the banana sweets… but the point is that I ended up regretting missing out on something far superior because I was keen to go home. I don’t suppose Palmer intended on bringing up these repressed memories but she will probably put some money towards my counselling because she’s a good sort.

From reading fan reactions, one of the most popular tracks on the album is ‘The Bed Song’, with Palmer just singing and tinkling her piano keys. It follows the lives of a couple by  documenting each of their sleeping locations from sleeping bag, to mattress on the floor of a hovel, to big bed and finally to the grave. One partner knows that something is wrong with the other but is too afraid to ask, whereas the other is too afraid to say anything and is instead waiting for the other to ask. It’s pretty bleak; they carry on this way until both are dead and side by side buried under a cherry tree, never knowing what the problem was. She sings, “I would have told you if you’d only asked me”, which will surely make you want to be a bit more open with people before you go and die, or at least man up and ask someone what is wrong. The singing in the verses of this track sounds quite jolly, while the lyrics contrast this, making for quite an uncomfortable listen.

Before you go and drown yourself in the bath, there are more jolly songs on the album such as ‘Lost’, not about confused polar bears on a Pacific island, but more so about losing things and people and them passing on. There are some nice lyrics here, which would lend nicely to tattoos for any obsessive fans, particularly,

“Nothing’s ever lost forever / it’s just caught inside the cushions of your couch / and when you find it you’ll have such a nice surprise”.            A motto for life.

Other good upbeat moments are ‘Want it Back’, ‘Massachusetts Avenue’ and ‘Melody Dean’, if you fancy a toe-tapper without so much emotional involvement. Of course like most other Amanda Palmer records,  around the end, in this case ‘Berlin’, that is very long and starts off really slow and boring before finally kicking off for the last minute or so, but I wouldn’t usually get that far unless I were for some reason unable to skip back to the start. For others that follow this pattern see: ‘Truce’, ‘Sing’, ‘Boston’, ‘Slide’.

So in summary, there’s enough here for everybody and it’s a case of picking and choosing which tracks would make your definitive track listing. For me I would go:

Smile (Pictures or It Didn’t Happen)
Do it With a Rockstar
Want it Back
Grown Man Cry
Lost
Bottomfeeder
The Bed song
Massachusetts  Avenue
Melody Dean
The Killing Type.

Oh, that seems to be the majority of the main tracks anyway, which is a nice sign. It’s definitely worth spending a US dollar, although you are given the option to spend more, if you’re made of money. You can also download it for free if you’re in completely dire straits, but you won’t get the bonus tracks. A final note: Of these bonus tracks, I would also recommend ‘Ukulele Anthem’, and I think this one can be downloaded for free from Palmer’s site anyway. That instrument I mentioned earlier was an electric ukulele and looked like a wooden spoon with strings. I have been intrigued by the uke since then, and Palmer and Patrick Wolf made me ask for one for Christmas one year, but I never got around to playing it until I heard Ukulele Anthem a year or two later. It really is as easy as Amanda makes out. Give it a go.

New Tune on Monday: Robbie Williams ‘Candy’

I am a big fan of Robbie Williams and his musical output is generally pretty good but I am always a bit wary of any new releases from him. His last album, ‘Reality Killed the Video Star’, as well as having a terrible title, featured three singles to which I had a mixed reaction.

I initially really liked ‘Bodies’  and thought it was pretty catchy, especially the chorus with its “All we’ve ever wanted is to look good naked / hope that someone could take it” lyric. My main memory of Bodies was getting drunk with a friend on Estonian strawberry liqueur that I won on a village tombola, when Bodies had one of its first plays on the radio. This song coming on and me saying “This isn’t bad” is my only memory of the whole night. Who knows what was in that bottle. So, the first pre-chorus after the middle eight with the BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM was great. The final euphoric chorus was also great, as was the big choir backing. I know it’s a bit cheesy to have a choir backing but I love it, it’s almost an admission that the singer doesn’t take himself too seriously (and in the case of Dappy’s ‘No Regrets’, it proved a hilarious addition for someone who usually tried to act cool.

So after its initial radio run, Bodies basically disappeared. The next single, ‘You Know Me’, with Robbie dressed as a rabbit in the video, was played to death on Heart, so naturally I came to really hate it and still skip it when I listen to his Greatest Hits album. Finally, ‘Morning Sun’, was pretty forgettable, but I’m always pleasantly surprised when I actually listen to it. All in all these singles didn’t really change my life, except perhaps the Estonian liqueur incident.

When Candy hit number one this weekend, the papers exclaimed that it was “Robbie’s first number one in eight years!!!”. I checked to see what his last one was and saw it was ‘Radio’, which was pretty terrible (but then I have a theory that most songs about radios are awful). Even the almost flawless four single streak of Feel, Come Undone, Something Beautiful, Sexed Upfailed to hit number one, but chart position is of course not an indication of song quality.

So, onto the actual song: It is co-written with Gazza B, which is immediately off-putting. I do wish that Robbie would stop working with Barlow and get back together with Guy Chambers though, as that’s where his best work was born and with Barlow he seems to be clinging onto the past and churning out dross (see: ‘Shame’). In short they are better apart (GB with Take That, obviously). Second point: I really hate any infiltration of American language into British English, so the title, for a start, annoyed me a little, but the song starts with a nice bit of brass, so all is forgiven. Candy’s strength lies in the infectious melody, it is definitely hummable, and in pop music that is a necessity. The chorus has a nice HEY! HO! sing-along, which is a welcome addition.

 This song sounds great on the radio and stands out among the current chart music. I can’t help feeling, as I sit with the sun shining in my eyes, that the song would have benefited from a summer release. Car windows wound down, blasting Candy out in a traffic jam is how it would sound best. So a late October release doesn’t seem right. If you take the song at face value, as a hummable pop song that is catchy and summery, it’s not so bad. Unfortunately, I have an annoying habit of listening to lyrics, which in pop music can make or completely break a song. My housemates always used to tell me to be quiet when I told them that Muse’s song lyrics were always the same; they had never paid attention to the lyrics and focused mainly on guitar solos, but for me the lyrics are key and this is where Candy is not only let down, but completely deflated. Robbie was on TV this week and pointed out that the lyrics were nonsensical, laughing, but he could have done something about that. Perhaps the worst offender, aside from the weird horses line is:

“Ring a ring of roses/ Whoever gets the closest/ She comes and she goes /As the war of the roses”

He’s just listing things that rhyme, it means nothing! If you’re having difficulty rhyming subsequent lines with your first line, change the first one, especially if it is meaningless anyway. There is no need to desperately keep rhyming more rubbish  until you have completed your verse and ended up with a nursery rhyme, when in the first line you could have nipped the nonsense in the bud (excuse the pun). And rhyming roses with roses… the unforgivable same-word rhyme, the less said on that, the better.

Anyway, I shouldn’t rant when it’s good old Robbie. He’s a good chap, always pleasant on the telly. I best get used to the song as I’m sure we’ll see plenty more performances on prime time shows soon, with Robbie standing on the stage and pointing the microphone at the audience and making them sing the song while he gets paid.

His classic move.

A brief introduction

Hello there.

It has come to my attention that I speak about pop music too often to people or care too little, so I have made a designated space on the internet where I can do so without affecting others.

A while ago I had intended to enter a competition to win an internship for people who wanted to become radio producers. One requirement for this was to come up for a feature that you would use in a radio show. I spent a long time thinking about this, in fact so long that by the time I had decided on my feature, the deadline had passed. So, here we have a little blog for me to play with this radio feature across a medium that is not radio. We’ll see how it goes.

TuneWaffle