Monthly Archives: October 2011

Late Nights With The Power Pop

The American singer-songwriter Matthew Sweet celebrates his 47th birthday today. I first heard of him in 1991 when he released his breakthrough album, Girlfriend, a record I’ll be looking at when it reaches its 20th anniversary in a few weeks. The type of music Sweet performs belongs to a genre known as power pop, which feature vocal harmonies and strong melodies as well as memorable guitar licks. Groups like The Beatles and Big Star have exerted the biggest influence on the genre. Sweet has covered these bands throughout his career and, with the help of Susanna Hoffs, released two fine albums of songs from the sixties and seventies. Their version of Who Knows Where the Time Goes? is taken from the first of those and features Hoffs on lead vocals with Sweet providing harmonies and the guitar parts. It’s preceded by three songs that Sweet has contributed to tribute albums over the years. Big Sky appears on This is Where I Belong: The Songs of Ray Davies. Let Me Be the One is from If I Were a Carpenter. And his quite effective take on the theme from Scooby Doo is part of a musical celebration of Saturday morning cartoon shows. The final song is Death Cab for Cutie’s acoustic version of the opening track from Sweet’s 100% Fun album. Sweet’s just released a new album called Modern Art and you can download a free track from it at his website. From what I’ve heard so far, it sounds like it could be a welcome return to previous form. Both the new album and Girlfriend are available in a number of different formats and I’ll reveal more when I revisit Girlfriend on October 22nd. Hope you have a sweet birthday, Matthew

Big Sky (Kinks cover) – Matthew Sweet

Let Me Be the One (Carpenters cover) – Matthew Sweet

Scooby Doo, Where Are You? – Matthew Sweet

Who Knows Where the Time Goes? (Sandy Denny cover) – Matthew Sweet & Susanna Hoffs

Sick of Myself (Matthew Sweet cover) – Death Cab for Cutie

I Quite Like Wednesdays, Actually

Former Boomtown Rat and current saint, Bob Geldof, celebrates his 60th birthday today. These days he’s best known as the organiser of Live Aid and its successor, Live 8, but there was a time when he helped to pave the way for Irish success on the international music stage. Geldof formed The Boomtown Rats in Dublin just as punk was kicking off on both sides of the Atlantic. In 1977, the band’s first single finished just outside the top spot in Ireland and also the top ten in England. Lookin’ After Number One, musically and lyrically, had much in common with the ethos of punk rock. It opens with pounding drums and is followed by some thrashy guitar before Geldof’s sneering vocals enter. The narrator is out of work and angry with society, but is adamant that he’ll do his own thing. This ideology would also appear to be the singer’s and it wasn’t too long before he could be heard railing against the status quo on TV. The band continued to have hits, though their sound could be described as new wave on subsequent releases. In 1978, their second album produced the band’s first UK number one, though it stalled at number two in their own country. Rat Trap replaced the prominent guitars with saxophone and piano and the song was more influenced by Van Morrison and Bruce Springsteen than punk. It’s basically a song The Boss might have written if he’d grown up in Dublin instead of Asbury Park

Continue reading →

The Good Life

This week’s instalment of Later with Jools Holland looks like being an improvement on the previous two episodes. The generation gap is evident on each show and, tonight, a whopping 64 years separates its two most well-known guests. The talented Laura Marling is only 21, but has just released her third album. The first two were shortlisted for the Mercury Prize and it wouldn’t be a surprise if A Creature I Don’t Know makes next year’s list. Brain Damage is an autobiographical song by Eminem about being bullied at school and is brilliantly performed below by Laura as a duet with Jeffrey Lewis. Miles Kane is best known for his membership of The Last Shadow Puppets along with Alex Turner of the Arctic Monkeys. He released his debut solo album earlier this year and he covers a guest who appeared on this season’s opening edition of Later. The 20th anniversary of the release of Nirvana’s Nevermind has spawned a number of tributes recently and Battle for Seattle is Little Roy‘s celebration of the band in a reggae style. I really like his version of Sliver and look forward to checking out the whole album. Joy Williams and John Paul White formed The Civil Wars in Nashville a few years ago and they released their debut LP at the beginning of the year. The duo prove to be smooth operators on their acoustic take on Sade’s 1992 hit that appears on their 2009 Live at Eddie’s Attic release. The Silver Seas are also from Nashville and have been going a bit longer. Château Revenge is the title of their third album from last year and it contains an extremely catchy tune called The Best Things in Life. The silver-haired Tony Bennett is four times as old as Laura Marling and is still going strong at 85. He’ll be promoting his second album of duets and is joined by the likes of Willie Nelson, Aretha Franklin, Lady Gaga and even Amy Winehouse on a load of classics. I was sure Bono would show up on the disc, but mercifully there’s no sign of him. Hopefully, Tony will perform I Left My Heart in San Francisco, a simple song that showcases his voice and phrasing, on this week’s show. Later with Jools Holland goes out live on BBC every Tuesday and Friday

Brain Damage (Eminem cover) – Laura Marling & Jeffrey Lewis

Heaven (Emeli Sandé cover) – Miles Kane

Sliver (Nirvana cover) – Little Roy

No Ordinary Love (Sade cover) – The Civil Wars

The Best Things In Life – The Silver Seas

I Left My Heart In San Francisco – Tony Bennett

Clockwise from top left: The Silver Seas; The Civil Wars; Tony Bennett; Little Roy; Laura Marling; Miles Kane