Everybody's favourite bagman

The best pop song you can't buy by a band who never made a record is "She's A Study" by TV Eyes. The video is here, what a shame these boys never managed to get it together for a full-length together. And for more videos of beautiful women cut together for maximum effect etc etc.

Scary Go Round playing cards are in progress. I'm working quite hard on the artwork, times 54, so it's going to be a while. Feel free to assist me with peppy feel-good messages. I could do one a day for 54 days, I suppose, but as it says on the right, I'm a man for the "big push".

I have wasted three and a half hours of my life

CAVEATS:
a. I have omitted all your favourites and only included my own
b. Gasps! as the Carpenters were pushed out of the number 100 spot at the last minute by the inclusion of The Bangles.
c. All order essentially arbitrary etc
d. Aforementioned rules broken where necessary

MY TOP 100 SINGLES

1 RACE FOR THE PRIZE - Flaming Lips
2 GRACE - Jeff Buckley
3 MONKEY GONE TO HEAVEN - The Pixies
4 ANGEL'S HEAP - Finn Brothers
5 STEREO - Pavement
6 TO HERE KNOWS WHEN - My Bloody Valentine
7 I FEEL FOR YOU - Chaka Khan
8 TURN! TURN! TURN! - The Byrds
9 GOD ONLY KNOWS - The Beach Boys
10 EBOW THE LETTER - R.E.M

11 YOU GET WHAT YOU GIVE - New Radicals
12 OH LORI - Alessi Brothers
13 THIRTEEN - Big Star
14 FLAVOUR OF THE MONTH - The Posies
15 HERE'S WHERE THE STORY ENDS - The Sundays
16 CHANGES - Sugar
17 UP WITH PEOPLE - Lambchop
18 PEG - Steely Dan
19 CONFETTI - The Lemonheads
20 CLOSE TO ME - The Cure

21 ANIMAL - Def Leppard
22 NEVER SAID - Liz Phair
23 FANFARE - Eric Matthews
24 THAT'S THE WAY LOVE IS - Ten City
25 WHAT HAVE I DONE TO DESERVE THIS - Pet Shop Boys
26 NOBODY'S TWISTING YOUR ARM - The Wedding Present
27 THIS IS WHAT SHE'S LIKE - Dexy's Midnight Runners
28 MARQUEE MOON - Television
29 OH PATTI (DON'T FEEL SORRY FOR LOVERBOY) - Scritti Politti
30 IN FRANCE THEY KISS ON MAIN STREET - Joni Mitchell

31 BLUE MONDAY - New Order
32 LITTLE RED CORVETTE - Prince
33 WHAT A FOOL BELIEVES - The Doobie Brothers
34 I WILL DARE - The Replacements
35 FEED THE TREE - Belly
36 THE CROWN - Gary Byrd
37 I SAW THE LIGHT - Todd Rundgren
38 TUMBLING DICE - Rolling Stones
39 MORE THAN THIS - Roxy Music
40 HIDEAWAY - The Olivia Tremor Control

41 BLUE - The Jayhawks
42 I KNOW YOU GOT SOUL - Eric B & Rakim
43 WICKED GAME - Chris Isaak
44 SHE'S SO YOUNG - The Pursuit of Happiness
45 CARNIVAL 2000 - Prefab Sprout
46 CYBELE'S REVERIE - Stereolab
47 WAIT - Robert Howard and Kym Mazelle
48 KEEP ON MOVIN' - Soul II Soul
49 SWEET CHILD O' MINE - Guns N' Roses
50 PSYCHO KILLER - Talking Heads

51 CANNONBALL - Breeders
52 YOUNG AMERICANS - David Bowie
53 THE BOY WITH THE THORN IN HIS SIDE - The Smiths
54 THE BEAT(EN) GENERATION - The The
55 WHERE IT'S AT - Beck
56 DON'T LET'S START - They Might Be Giants
57 EVERYTHING COUNTS - Depeche Mode
58 MUSIC SOUNDS BETTER - Stardust
59 LIPGLOSS - Pulp
60 HOT BURRITO #1 - Flying Burrito Brothers

61 LITTLE SISTER - Ry Cooder
62 HOLLAND, 1945 - Neutral Milk Hotel
63 ONCE AROUND THE BLOCK - Badly Drawn Boy
64 WALLS COME TUMBLING DOWN - Style Council
65 IT WAS A GOOD DAY - Ice Cube
66 I WANNA DESTROY YOU - The Soft Boys
67 THIS IS A CALL - Foo Fighters
68 CALIFORNIA LOVE - 2Pac feat Dr Dre + Roger Troutman
69 EVERYTHING FLOWS - Teenage Fanclub
70 MAP REF 41°N 93°W - Wire

71 I'LL NEVER FALL IN LOVE AGAIN - Bobbie Gentry
72 TANGLED UP IN BLUE - Bob Dylan
73 THE WEIGHT - The Band
74 SUGARCUBE - Yo La Tengo
75 REGULATE - Warren G + Nate Dogg
76 UNCLE ALBERT/ADMIRAL HALSEY - Paul McCartney
77 HOMETOWN UNICORN - Super Furry Animals
78 STILL DRE - Dr Dre
79 TAKE A RUN AT THE SUN - Dinosaur Jr
80 YOU AND YOUR SISTER - This Mortal Coil

81 LORELEI - Cocteau Twins
82 NEVER TOO MUCH - Luther Vandross
83 I LOVE THE UNKNOWN - Clem Snide
84 WIRED FOR SOUND - Cliff Richard
85 SIX MONTHS IN A LEAKY BOAT - Split Enz
86 SON OF SAM - Elliott Smith
87 LEARNING TO FLY - Tom Petty
88 B.O.B - Outkast
89 MAN, I FEEL LIKE A WOMAN - Shania Twain
90 SUGAR KANE - Sonic Youth

91 TWIGGY TWIGGY/TWIGGY VS JAMES BOND - Pizzicato 5
92 IN BLOOM - Nirvana
93 WHAT TIME IS LOVE - KLF
94 GROOVEJET (IF THIS AIN'T LOVE) - Spiller feat Sophie Ellis-Bextor
95 WINTER - Tori Amos
96 IF SHE KNEW WHAT SHE WANTS - The Bangles
97 INTERGALACTIC - Beastie Boys
98 BATTLE OF WHO COULD CARE LESS- Ben Folds Five
99 BREAKOUT - Swing Out Sister
100 THE EAGLE AND ME - Van Dyke Parks

What have I done?

Vera Brosgol asked me what my top ten songs of all time are. Obviously to work this out, I had to do a list of 100. Now things are out of control.

I had to make up some rules:

1. Has to have been a single
2. One song per artist
3. Songs must have achieved a certain vintage (4.5 years, ie 1/6 of my life) to ensure lasting appeal

Thank god the iTunes music store has sound clips or this would take all day.

Recent questions I have asked myself/statements I have made:
"Which is the best Erasure single?"
"It really never got worse than the Wildhearts, did it?"
"Motownphilly back again, with a little bit of east coast swing"
"Gulf War means JESUS JONES"

A poem for wednesday

2003 and all that

Do you remember
Way back in ought-three
We were all a little younger

It was the year that
Everyone lost it
And pretended
That "In An Aeroplane
Over The Sea"
Was the greatest record
Ever released*

We got carried away with
our thoughts and our feelings
Decided the Wrens
Were better than the Beatles*

It was a time to be young,
To be sad
To read Pitchfork

What happened to those days?


FIN


* It was pretty good but we had gone crazy
* The Wrens are pretty good but they probably aren't as good as the Beatles

She has a dark quality

Painted this afternoon, acrylic on canvas, 18"x12".



Painting has a soothing way with me now, after the early disasters (they are in the bin). Unfortunately there are only about 4 months of the year that feature days where I can paint out of doors, so who knows if this will be a summer fling?

Facts about ME

Dear John

you are dark character, constantly pursued by a floating skull in a grainy photo that is the only way that we (the readers) can know you. You soundtrack your life with a selection of very carefully chosen "indie" records by the likes of Jacob's Crumbhammer (Canadian post-rock par excellence) and C86 favourites The Ironing Boards. You let the back of your iPod get all scratched so you wouldn't have to accidentally catch your own gaze. Sometimes you think about a girl you knew and draw her name in a biro tattoo under a unicorn on your arm. John, why is your favourite website Popjustice?

Kind regards
Your readers

Fantastic

What a great, great day.

Oh, no wait. What I did there was say the exact opposite of the truth.

Horse and hattock, fly!

Here's day 2 of my experimental experimentation. It's just for fun, to look at. They aren't going to print this on bank notes.

More from the experiments desk

I'm still trying to make the brush work. Brushwork. Brushwork work. i figure I'll have to do a few dozen like this before the process is anything like predictable. So here's number 1. Maybe there will be another, it depends on problems.

Children of the devolution

Also yesterday I painted these pictures, simultaneously. At the same time. They're 18 inches tall, the same height as an enraged gnome at full elongation.

It has gone wrong

I doodled on a bit of scrap paper then inked it with a brush for practice. But when I looked at it, i realised that what I had done was give the Feds all the evidence they needed to put me away. Do not link to this image.

Live 8

I'm very excited about Live 8. Music is going to be a wasteland after this. Forty more years of corporate Coldplay rock and it's all we deserve for ragging the hell out of Africa.

I did enjoy Noel Gallagher's (extremely astute) take on Live 8 (from contactmusic.com):

"The outspoken OASIS guitarist believes rock stars simply don't have the influence needed to affect the G8 decision makers - and believes all their hard work will be in vain.

He says, "Correct me if I'm wrong, but are they hoping that one of these guys from the G8 is on a quick 15 minute break at Gleneagles (in Scotland) and sees ANNIE LENNOX singing SWEET DREAMS and thinks, 'F**k me, she might have a point there, you know?'

"KEANE doing SOMEWHERE ONLY WE KNOW and some Japanese businessman going, 'Aw, look at him... we should really f**king drop that debt, you know.'

"It's not going to happen, is it?" "

I laugh every time I think about that article. Well done Noel.