What does Spring mean to me in respect of Music? There’s the literal interpretation, which just sounds a bit too dry to me - do you know any songs about crocuses? And there’s the figurative representation of it being about renewal, emergence and growth. I think we decided to go a third route (although you’ll have to see the column right to confirm that, I could have gotten this completely wrong.) To me, this alternative means the energy and life that some music can bring out of us to make us feel joyful and expectant. Perhaps hope is an appropriate word here too.
Spring is also a striking contrast to the gloominess of Autumn and Winter, two seasons that very much invoke depression. I can be a bit of a mope at times - and there’s an awful lot of mope-worthy music in my collection - perfectly summarised within the opening lines of High Fidelity: “Did I listen to pop music because I was miserable, or was I miserable because I listened to pop music?”
For this theme, therefore, I’ve chosen songs that give me that fist-pumping impetus, that give me a natural high, that make me deliriously happy to be on this planet, that I love listening to when out and about, walking. Believe it not, extensive trawling through my collection revealed there to be at least thirty candidates, which for a miserablist like me is quite staggering. Here are, perhaps, my top five.
Love Corporation - Love
Just look at that cover. Ed Ball, musical polymath and one time executive at Creation Records wrote this first Love Corporation album, which he delightfully calls “the 2nd Acid House album” on his MySpace page - just in case you didn’t deduce that from the cover. It was released in February 1991 towards the closing months of the Second Summer of Love.
Love is the opening track and it’s all about the piano. Unusually, it begins like a coda. A simple but melodic, jaunty housey piano dominates. Its pitch flitting amongst the soft shuffling beats and acid squiggles. In effect a summary of all the dance music that appeared during those years. Then just when we’re becoming accustomed to its prettiness, the tune turns darker through hanging squalls and delays.
But that exists only to highlight the elated conclusion where the piano lead occasionally sprouts bluesy chords and we discover that this coda was actually just the beginning of a much longer sequence. Whether Love is composed or improvised doesn’t matter, it’s lovely.
Love Corporation - MySpace
Love Corporation - Ed Ball
Love Corporation - Last.fm
Republica - Ready to Go
It’s difficult to imagine this song existing without its accompanying videos - there are at least three of them. In fact, were it not for those videos, the song might not have the energy it does. One time N-Joi singer Saffron does her blokish ladette impression, in an extreme sneering example of what’s now called Mockney. She happened to do that on all of Republica’s songs, not that I’m complaining. So when she sings “I’m standing on the rooftops ‘aving it!” you know and feel exactly how she feels. Sure, there’s a darkness behind the exuberance of the song, but that’s not stopped it featuring on hundreds of (mostly football) compilation CDs.
Ready To Go was released in 1996 as the forerunner to their eponymous debut album, although two other singles had arrived two years earlier, including Bloke - which was part of my answer to TheYank’s curve-ball question last year “What Republica song are you?”
If you want a stereotypical example of how all house piano sounded during that time, this is it - Love Corporation’s piano isn’t full enough, which is why the US-centric rock mix of this song is so disappointing: dropping the piano and Garbage-ing it up with extra grinding guitar riffs, thereby removing much of its cheerfulness.
Such is my love of the videos that I had to include one here. This, I think, is the second version that was made for the UK market. It’s longer than the original and is special because, well, Saffron’s pink jacket is just gorgeous:
Republica - Last.fm
Republica - Republica (Amazon UK, Amazon US, iTunes)
Tiga - Pleasure from the Bass
Don’t get me wrong, I love Canada. Some of my favourite people are Canadian. But it’s so underpopulated that anyone who makes music ends up winning a Juno Award at some point in their career. Tiga James Sontag is no exception, winning the 2007 Dance Recording of the Year for the ‘concept album’ that is Sexor - from which this song comes.
This is ideal strutting (not walking) music, in an “opening scene to Saturday Night Fever” kind of way - although have you noticed that in the Bee Gees’ video they just amble? What’s that all about? One listen to the dot-dot dot–dot dash bassline will get you moving, especially when Tiga’s vocals join in so percussively. His fairly nonsensical phrases are usually delivered in a call and response fashion, building and releasing tension several times a measure. As with all good dance music, this is as much about the space between each sound as it is the music itself.
Once you’re hooked into the song through those rhythms, Pleasure from the Bass stays interesting by adding synth lines which mirror or complement the bass, becoming more acidic as the song nears its conclusion. Elsewhere there are builds through the introduction of other percussion - in particular the surprise arrival of lightning handclaps, which serve to defuse then reset expectations. Tiga’s monotone vocals playfully turn into melodies at unexpected moments to increase the brilliance of this track.
And it’s all over in just under four minutes.
Tiga - official website
Tiga - Last.fm
Tiga - Sexor (Amazon UK, Amazon US, iTunes)
Cut Copy - Lights & Music
Last year’s Cut Copy album is the one that LCD Soundsystem should have made back in 2005, instead of the tedious techno trudge that James Murphy ended up releasing (and, yeah, maybe I was the only person on the planet not to be impressed, but still). In comparison, In Ghost Colours is a neon rainbow, burning out retinas through its palatial indie-dance - and it’s proof that Australia does have some musical talent.
Lights & Music, positioned as that all-important third track, is a homage to thrill of dance, played out through the eyes of illicit or unrequited love - of what exactly we’re never told: “Lights and music are on my mind. Be my baby one more time,” and as such could be a companion piece to its predecessor Out There on the Ice.
In contrast to Tiga’s song, this works through multiple layers of sound, shifting sublimely from verse to chorus, break and drop. There’s no rush to get to the rush: that’s why there are two opening stanzas, occupied by bass and lead guitars, achingly kept apart by just that bassline and a shimmering synthetic haze, When the chorus does arrive a full two minutes in, it’s via a two-dimensional swept riff, a rollercoaster teasing us before the fall. Then - just to mess with our heads - Madonna-esque chords teleport us back to the Eighties.
Cut Copy - official website
Cut Copy - Last.fm
Cut Copy - Lights & Music (Amazon UK, Amazon US, iTunes)
Puretone - Stuck in a Groove (Radio Edit)
“Because I’m stuck in a groove, I didn’t hear what you said. Because there’s too many tunes going round in my head”
And lookie here: another Melbourne-ite. Josh G. Abrahams’ second collaboration with fellow Australian Amiel Daemion was less successful than Addicted to Bass, which had reached #2 in the UK in 2002, three years after its Australian debut. Stuck in a Groove is however the far more accomplished song, although it only reached #26. A sure sign of a one hit wonder.
I’m soft on songs about music, even if they start with a sleepy R&B acoustic guitar cut-up and the most trite lyrics - as this one does - because once they filter away, Amiel’s dryly processed spoken / sung intro is beguiling. Behind this, the backing revs up towards the chorus. When that hits with its power chords, sparkling keys and pad bass (think Hybrid), it’s a direct reminder of all the incredible things that music can do. Then, just to the strengthen the point, it’s re-interpreted, stripped down and bettered on the short break just before the close.
My next door neighbour often wonders why I frequently ignore her when she passes by me, out and about in Inverness. She needs to listen to this song.
Puretone - Last.fm
Puretone - Stuck in a Groove [full song]
Puretone - Stuck in a Groove (Amazon UK, Amazon US, iTunes)
Looking back at these five songs, three of them have some bearing or relationship to music. Not surprising really since whenever I’m out walking - and I prefer to walk anywhere than use transport - I’m plugged into my iPhone. Obsessed, me? Yes, and I love it.
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