Thursday, April 15, 2021
30 Songs In 30 Colours (a 30-day Song Challenge Done Wrong) #Fragments
Last year I Tweeted a different song every day for a #30DaySongChallenge. Only one drawback: I’d read ahead and there were several questions I just didn’t want to think about. So I Tweeted for thirty days anyway – just answering for Day 1, thirty times (never let it be said that once I think up a terrible joke or a diversionary tactic I don’t flog both to death).
Besides, it
turns out there really are a lot of really great songs with colours in them.
I’ve picked
today (the anniversary of somewhere-in-the-middle-of-it) to collect these into
a post because (in the middle of not an easy time) the most fun of the lot is
both the colour grey – not anyone’s first choice for joy – and a car – not mine
– and yet…
1 – Goldfinger
Saluting
Honor Blackman – and because it’s so magnificent I’d have picked it anyway.
There are
several here I really don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a
time…
At the same
time last year I was Tweeting a James Bond favourite every day too, but
properly. Not all my picks were
Goldfinger… But top Bond theme was, obviously (as one Bond composer put it, “If
you’re dead, you wake up for that”). I’ve already turned that set into a blog post – worth reading for the one-liners.
1 – Tired of
Midnight Blue (George Harrison)
A brilliantly
bluesy piano number unexpectedly turns up to give extra texture.
And it’d gone
midnight, and I was tired, so…
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – The Red
Shoes (Kate Bush)
Fantastic in
several senses, with bonus colours on the same album in Why Should I Love You?
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Union
City Blue (Blondie)
Coolly
iconic. Also, their:
Put Some
Color On You
Much newer
Blondie, and a real stomper. Love it (but not appropriately social-distancing).
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Theme
from The Black Hole
Queasy
swirling weirdness underpinned by magnificently threatening ‘What A Magnificent
Vista (Were It Not Being Swallowed By This Endless Maw Into Hell)’ John Barry
strings.
[A couple of
months ago I performed a scientific observer bias test and found that I mainly
hear the unsettling weaving weirdness if I’m watching the wireframe spiral on
screen, while mainly notice the orchestral underpinning if I’m just listening
rather than getting the visual cues.]
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – The White
Tree (Howard Shore)
A
magnificent, uplifting fanfare to light the Beacons of Gondor and send flame
rushing to the West.
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Moonlight
and Gold (Gerry Rafferty)
A gorgeous
love song yearning through the night to the dawn (from North and South,
probably his best album).
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Grey
Cortina (Tom Robinson Band)
I don’t care
about cars at all, but too many car songs are just too much fun.
This is
probably the most lively and joyous of the lot.
A year ago today!
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Dazzling
Blue (Paul Simon)
Percussive,
laid back groove.
You see? I
can pick songs from the last decade.
The artist’s
been around since long before I was born, obviously.
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Yellow
Submarine (The Beatles)
(I’d’ve made
this an earlier 1, but didn’t want it to be the obvious ‘cramped in a small space
and can’t go outside’ and lose its fun)
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Old Brown
Shoe (The Beatles)
So lively!
Wowsa George fast-bubbling bass and lead. A very ‘A’ B-side.
Bonus: For
You Blue, the most bouncily happy of blues.
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Mr Blue
Sky (Electric Light Orchestra)
Because you
can’t beat a bit of ELO.
Glorious
(especially as the close of Concerto For a Rainy Day).
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Blue Monday
(New Order)
Inspired
electro-dance downbeat-beat-beat-beat-beat to get you going without admitting
you want to.
Just how I
should feel today…
Presses
repeat on ‘There are several…’ meta-gag
[And if you’re wondering why I kept in all of those, now you know. Really‽ Really]
1 – Blue
Savannah (Erasure)
A rather
lovely swirling ballad with a simple but hugely memorable video (which sends me
on my way back to Goldfinger; don’t try this at home)
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – GoldenEye
(Tina Turner)
An
outstanding Bond theme and terrific performance (great video, too).
Up there with
She’s a Mystery to Me as the best ever of Bono and the Edge.
[I compiled all 40 – no, you read correctly – into a playlist today, only to find this was the only one I’d not imported into iTunes and couldn’t find the CD single. Looking it up, though I own the single edit (technically, somewhere), there is a longer album edit, so I didn’t feel bad about buying that just now to complete the set. Just for once, the longer version’s not as good. The film edit ends with a bang.]
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – California
Blue (Roy Orbison)
Rather lovely
in its yearning (I reminded myself of it with yesterday’s).
And why not
add the other Traveling Wilburys in New Blue Moon?
[I coincidentally sequenced this for Roy’s birthday (April 23rd) and didn’t notice until afterwards.]
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Every
Shade of Blue (Bananarama)
Last night was rough [356 nights ago, but so was last night and it’s a fair bet so will the next] and I was up most of it, so despite the lyrics this is a more upbeat listen in daylight.
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Strike Me
Pink (Deborah Harry)
Melting
coolness from Debravation. Evocative song, great album title (still waiting for
Debravity).
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – White
Wedding (Billy Idol)
A roar of
excitement!
I was
scheduled to go with White Room (Cream), but that day was our semiversary [April 26th,
mid-way from October 26th]. I think I prefer this one, too!
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Morse
Moose and the Grey Goose (Paul McCartney & Wings)
A great sound
from London Town – fuzzing guitar and groovy bass. Love a track that starts big
and builds!
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Blond and Blue (Tom Robinson)
An unhappy
love song…
and
Green (Tom
Robinson)
A – much more upbeat – savage bit of satire:
“It’s an eco-revolution using market forces / As we carry on guzzling the world’s resources”
[insert daily recycled line]
1 – Gold
(Spandau Ballet)
Always
believe in your soul!
Big sound,
Lib Dem anthem, and I had this lined up before seeing Twitter full of
fancying Martin Kemp that evening [can I remember why? Did I even know at the time?].
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Grey Day
(Madness)
Doom-laden
chimes, heavy piano, distorted guitar, despairing lyrics – probably their most
downbeat hit, and possibly my favourite.
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Jack In
the Green (Jethro Tull)
Feels more
Beltane this morning [May 1st] than my scheduled The Big Bright
Green Pleasure Machine (though I could really do with one of those).
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Paint It
Black (Rolling Stones)
Black Sunrise
(Marc Almond)
And not in
the title but very much in tone, My Little Town (Simon and Garfunkel)
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Purple
Haze (Jimi Hendrix)
An incredible
sound and – appropriately purple – embraced in performance as distinctly bi:
that girl put a spell on me / ’scuse me while I kiss this guy
Several I
don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Mellow
Yellow (Donovan)
Something a
bit cheery and relaxing for a new week (same as the old week) when being mostly
more incredibly stressed and angry Yellow.
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
1 – Yellow
(Jodie Whittaker)
Rather
beautiful.
Green Grow
the Rushes…
Oh! You’re
thinking REM; I’m thinking John Steed (Patrick Macnee) resisting mind control.
And tune control.
[See The Avengers – Too Many Christmas Trees. And you should.]
There are
some here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time.
1 – Golden
Brown (The Stranglers)
Gorgeous.
Always planned for the penultimate day, alongside eerie
Blue Veils
and Golden Sands (Delia Derbyshire)
Yet suddenly
mournful.
[This was May 6th, getting the schedule slightly wrong so one day late for Delia Derbyshire, but coincidentally also having just seen the news that Stranglers keyboard player Dave Greenfield had passed away]
There are
several here I don’t want to face, but I cope (when I do) one day at a time…
When I first saw the challenges on this list, I thought:
‘Oh no; this one, this, and that would just be too disheartening to go into – I can’t do it.’
And I wouldn’t have, but immediately the old eye-roller ‘Deal with problems one day at a time!’ popped into my head…
Which is how I realised:
‘Oh, I couldn’t. Could I? That would be a terrible, awful gag, and I’d have to keep it going long, long after it stopped being funny.
‘I could!’
And so I’ve been re-setting to day one at a time every day for twenty-nine days.
One more. Just one.
Or is it?
1 – 99 Red
Balloons / 99 Luftballons (Nena)
At last, a
number – could this be Day 2?
…No.
30 days on,
it’s the end of the run and end of the world.
And one last
colour, after all.
I hope you’ve
enjoyed the songs in your ears and colours in your eyes! I did.
Labels: Fragments, Memes, Music
