Songs to Learn and Sing: Christmas 2004 Compilations
A few words on Songs to Learn and Sing taking in: Christmas 2004 compilation mix CDs, 20 years of tunes, streaming, and more.
“Songs to Learn and Sing presents music to soothe your savage breast.”
Selected, mixed and annotated by Paul McDermott and Cillian Donnelly in December 2004.
In October I wrote about the 20th anniversary of my radio show (Songs to Learn and Sing: 20th Anniversary). Around the time I wrote that post I found a few CDs in the attic.
In December 2004 to celebrate the first Christmas of Songs to Learn and Sing being on air myself and my old friend Cillian Donnelly, who co-presented the programme for about a year before emigrating to Belgium, compiled two CD compilations that we distributed to family, friends and listeners.
This was old-school mixtape compiling - though in our case we burnt the compilations onto CDs. We produced CD inlay sleeves and extensive liner notes. Cillian definitely chose the cover stars for both volumes - Volume 1 (Learn) Virginia Mayo and Volume 2 (Sing) Troy Donahue. Mayo died on 17 January 2005, a few weeks after we had produced our compilation, but I don’t think her death registered with me at the time. Donahue had passed away in 2001.
I compiled Volume 1 (Learn) and Cillian compiled Volume 2 (Sing). Both CDs give a good representation of the artists we were listening to in 2004 and the songs that featured on the earliest playlists of Songs To Learn And Sing.
When I tried to play Volume 1 (Learn) it skipped after a few tunes so I took to Spotify and created a playlist of both compilations. All the songs were on Spotify except two tunes - ‘What Will the Corporation Do?’ and ‘Mountain Trip to Japan 1959’ - by The Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players.
As I wrote in the liner notes, The Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players used to take vintage slide collections that they found at garage sales and turn the lives of anonymous strangers into pop-rock musical exposes based on the contents of these slide collections. ‘What Will the Corporation Do?’ and ‘Mountain Trip to Japan 1959’ were taken from the album Vintage Slide Collections From Seattle, Vol. I, released in 2004 on Bar/None Records.
I’ve written about Bar/None Records twice before on this blog (Bill Drummond’s The Man and Dead Dog’s Eyeball). It seems quite strange that music released in this century isn’t available on streaming services and just makes me glad that I’ve hung onto my collection of CDs.
Thankfully ‘Mountain Trip to Japan 1959’ is on YouTube:
Volume 1 (Learn)
Songs to Learn and Sing: Volume 1 (Learn)
Cover star: Virginia Mayo
1. Tinariwen – ‘Oualahila Ar Teninam’
The members of Tinariwen met in a rebel training camp in Libya. Some decided to trade their weapons for instruments and perform songs of political protest.
2. The Knife – ‘Kino’
A brother and sister duo (Karin and Olof) from Sweden, they claim their music - which is a glorious blend of melodic electro-pop, machine-made rhythms and dark, curveball twists - is nothing more than pop, yet their songs speak of an informed and subversive political agenda. They refuse to play live and deride rock ‘n’ roll for being outdated.
3. (The Real) Tuesday Weld – ‘Bathtime in Clerkenwell’
It’s a lot to ask: write songs about love, death, time and memory. Inform them with a narrative and musical sensibility at once intelligent, wry, witty, playful and profound. Be understated yet poetic. romantic yet post-modern, English yet universal. Admit your worst fears and failings, but remain charming and irresistibly cool. It’s a lot to ask. But, one-man-industry (The Real) Tuesday Weld (aka Stephen Coates, aka The Clerkenwell kid) has made it his working brief.
4. Tilly and the Wall – ‘Fell Down the Stairs’
Tilly and the Wall are a quirky, playful group with an unusual percussionist: tap dancer Jamie Williams, whose amplified stomping and clapping keeps the beat.
5. The Concretes – ‘You Can't Hurry Love’
It’s a mix of the Velvet Underground and the Supremes. The Concretes formed in 1995 as a trio in Sweden. When playing live they often have up to eighteen members on stage, together they make sparse orchestral pop music that is at once familiar and new sounding.
6. Coco Rosie – ‘By Your Side’
Coco Rosie is Bianca and Sierra Casady. Sierra sings and plays guitar: Bianca sings, rattles things and makes things squeak
7. Smoosh – ‘Pygmy Motorcycle’
Soosh are two sisters from Seattle. Chloe is just 10 years old and Asya is 12. They write and perform their own songs.
7. Leroy Anderson – ‘The Typewriter’
Leroy Anderson was a composer in the 1940s and '50s who wrote playful tunes that incorporated everyday sounds ticking clocks, like this song, a typewriter.
8. LCD Soundsystem – ‘Movement’
LCD Soundsystem is one James Murphy, co-creator of DFA records and one half of the DFA production team(with Mo Wax co-founder Tim Goldsworthy). Movement isn’t as good as Yeah, Beat Connection or for that matter Losing My Edge.
9. Nouvelle Vague – ‘A Forest’
Take 2 French musicians, Marc Collin and Olivier Libaux. Take some of their old post-punk record collection. Now strip these songs down to the bare bones and give them a 60s Brazilian bossa feel, with a big dose of French pop mixed in, giving vocal dudes to eight predominantly French female singers. Sounds awful doesn’t it? It’s actually really good.
10. Low – ‘Monkey’
Taken from their soon be released album The Great Destroyer.
11. Lali Puna – ‘Call 1800 Fear’
Lali Puna are from Munich, Germany. The band was brought to life in early 1998 by Valeria Trebeljahr who sings and plays keyboards. Then came Markus Acher, relaxing from his Notwist duties. This track is from Faking the Books.
12. The Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players – ‘What Will the Corporation Do?’ / ‘Introductions’ / ‘Mountain Trip to Japan 1959’
The Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players are an indie-vaudeville conceptual art-rock pop band! They take vintage slide collections that they have found at garage sales and turn the lives of anonymous strangers into pop-rock musical exposes based on the contents of these slide collections.
Note: This is the only song from this compilation that’s not on Spotify so I’ve swapped it out for another Trachtenberg Family song - ‘Look At Me’
13. Chicks on Speed (feat. Peaches) – ‘We Don’t Play Guitars’
‘We Don’t Play Guitars’, insist Chicks On Speed to a glam rock beat until Peaches tums up to add a guitar solo.
14. The Beta Band – ‘Assessment’
Heroes to Zeroes kicked off with this spunky, horn-assisted track, they then broke up!
15. The Creekdippers – ‘Bath Song’
Mark Olson and Victoria Williams have spent the last few years knocking out homemade albums of rustic Americana, far removed from the slick country rock of post-Olson Jayhawks. The Creekdippers bring warmth and love to the old, weird America.
16. The Ukrainians – ‘Batyar’
Peter Solowka’s Wedding Present side project pay tribute to Morrissey.
17. Morrissey – ‘First of the Gang to Die’
The comeback king of 2004 and possibly one of his greatest singles to date.
18. The Count Five – ‘Psychotic Reaction’
Formed in 1964 in San Jose, California, Count Five were a classic one-hit wonder whose Yardbirds-inspired psychedelic-punk hit ‘Psychotic Reaction’, reached the Top 5 in 1966. They drew attention by wearing Dracula-style capes to their gigs. After recording one album, also titled Psychotic Reaction, they continued to release singles before disbanding in 1969. Lester Bangs was a big fan!
19. The South Bank Orchestra – ‘Black Beauty’
‘The New Adventures of Black Beauty’ performed by the South Bank Orchestra and conducted by Denis King.
20. RJD2 – ‘Since We Last Spoke’
A drum-funk tour-de-force, this record continued Def Jux’s unparalleled creative streak, spotlighting Rjd2 as the only hip-hop producer since DJ Shadow capable of taking to both long-form rhythmic experiments and 3:30 rap cages with such effortless dexterity.
21. Israel Kamakawiwo’ole – ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’ / ‘What a Wonderful World’
Nicknamed the “Gentle Giant”, Hawaiian Israel Kamakawiwo’ole has a tender voice with a giant sound. Throughout the latter part of his life, Iz was considered obese and at one point weighed over 750 pounds. He suffered several hospitalisations and died of weight-related respiratory illness on June 26, 1997 at the age of 38. He is best known for this medley.
22. William Shatner (feat. Joe Jackson & Ben Folds) – ‘Common People’
Performed by a man now 73 years old. And somehow, it just might be the pop song of the year.
Volume 2 (Sing)
Songs to Learn and Sing: Volume 2 (Sing)
Cover star: Troy Donahue
1. Lloyd Price – ‘Stagger Lee’
New Orleans take on the oft-told story of Stagger Lee, the gambler who shot and killed Bily Lyons on Christmas Day 1895. Other versions of the tale include, Cab Calloway, Bob Dylan and Nick Cave.
2. The Clash – ‘Wrong ‘Em Boyo’
From their seminal 1979 double album London Calling, here The Clash expound the story of the aforementioned Stagger Lee with this cover of The Rulers’ rocksteady classic
3. The Million Dollar Quartet – ‘Just a Little Walk with Jesus’
On Tuesday December 4, 1956 RCA star Elvis Presley took a trip back to Sun Studios in Memphis and found himself singing old gospel songs and contemporary numbers with Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash and Jerry Lee Lewis. Studio head Sam Phillips decided to record
4. Solomon Burke – ‘Diamond on My Head’
An instant classic, written by Tom Waits, from Solomon’s 2002 ‘comeback’ album Don’t Give Up On Me. His February 2003 gig at Dublin’s Vicar Street may just be the greatest the city has ever witnessed.
5. Desmond Decker and the Aces – ‘Shanty Town (007)’
A ska gem and Top 20 hit from 1957
6. Vivian Stanshall Sean Head Showband – ‘Labio-Dental Fricative’
This offbeat song was released in 1970 as part of Vivian Stanshall’s unrealised plan of releasing a series of singles under different names. Eric Clapton plays guitar.
7. Barry Booth – ‘The Hottest Day of the Year’
Charmingly English whimsy from long deleted 1968 psych-light classic, Diversions! Booth has worked with, amongst others, Roy Orbison, Bert Jansch, Topol, Kenneth Williams and Rolf Harris, while the lyrics to this song were penned by a pre-Monty Python Michael Palin.
8. Scott Walker – ‘The Old Man’s Back Again (Dedicated to The Neo-Stalinist Regime)’
From the reclusive genius’ fourth eponymous album, which was “deleted soon after release” according to the CD reissue sleeve.
9. MJ Hibbett and the Validators – ‘The Saturday Lunchtime Wrestlers’
Great antidote to all those I Love… nostalgia programmes from Songs To Learn And Sing hero and purveyor of fine, off-kilter cover versions.
10. Fairport Convention – ‘Si tu Dois Partir’
A French language version of Bob Dylan's 'If You Gotta Go, Go Now’.
11. The Incredible String Band – ‘Swift as the Wind’
Bizarro-folk from Mike Heron and Robin Williamson, taken from the album The Hangman’s Beautiful Daughter.
12. The Bonzo Dog Band – ‘The Intro and the Outro’
Along with ‘Cool Britannia’ and ‘Big Shot’ this provided the faux hip core to the Bonzo’s masterful debut Gorilla, easily the funniest album made by any of that era.
13. Dexys Midnight Runners – ‘The Teams That Meet in Caffs’
From 1980, this sees the band influenced by soul stirrers before they became gypsies and existential accountants.
14. Roxy Music – ‘Beauty Queen’
Classic retro-futurism from 1973, just before Brian Eno jumped ship and Bryan Ferry started dating supermodels.
15. Marianne Faithful – ‘Why D’ya Do it’
Remember kids, it’s not big and it’s not clever.
16. Marvin Gaye – ‘T Stands For Trouble’
From the soundtrack to the little seen Blaxploitation flick Trouble Man starring Robert Hooks and Julius ‘Tee Hee’ Harris; the album remained Marvin Gaye’s favourite amongst his own records.
17. Love – ‘Seven And Seven Is’
Some say this penetrating slice of garage pop from 1967 remains Arthur Lee’s finest 2 minutes and 15 seconds. Later in the year, he would begin work on Forever Changes.
18. The Sonics – ‘Strychnine’
From Tacoma, Washington, The Sonics, along with The Count Five and The Kingsmen, defined the mid-60sg garage sound. Lead singer Gerry Roslie’s throat-ripping vocals saw him dubbed the “White Little Richard”.
19. Joe Strummer and the Mescaleros – ‘Bhindi Bhagee’
From the late, great Joe Strummer’s 2001 genre-bouncing tour de force, Global A Go-Go.
20. Lou Christie – ‘Trapeze’
Pure pop brilliance from the former teen idol endorsed by John Lennon, Elton John and Madonna.
21. The Mothers of Invention – ‘Go Cry On Somebody Else’s Shoulder’
Taken from Freak Out!, rock’s first double album, this sees Frank Zappa’s Merry Pranksters take on Doo Wop, teenagers, pop lyrics and Eisenhower's America in one deceptively sly pop treat
22. The Dukes of Stratosphear – ‘Pale and Precious’
Impeccable Smile era Beach Boys pastiche from XTC’s psychedelic offshoot, taken from the 1987 album, Psonic Psunsopt.
