"where the wild roses grow" - chicks on speed

"on the second day i brought her a flower. she was more beautiful than any woman i'd seen"


there was something sensual about the cave and kylie version of this song. but the chicks on speed version is hauntingly terrifying. i'd never heard of chicks on speed until i saw we dont play guitars on mtv2 late one night and thought it was awesome. most of their other material that ive heard is kinda ok but the other standout track is this one. the gently nightmarish whisper of the vocal tone, the unplaceable wrongness of the production - its scary stuff.


it was dydd santes dwynwen yesterday and for various personal reasons that would only seem like excuse if i expounded on them i didnt buy my wife a flower. i must rectify that today.

"waiting" - the rentals

"i'm waiting with nothing to do. i'm waiting, just waiting on you"


a loser named greg sold me return of the rentals on cassette one lunchtime for 50p and a packet of nerds. fond as i am of nerds, with their ability to seem cool despite just being small oddly-shaped lumps of sugar, he clearly got the poor end of that deal because, whilst i would have had a total of maybe 15 minutes of pleasure from that pack of sweets and whatever i would have blown the 50p on, i have whiled away many many happy hours listening to this lo-fi newwave classic. i almost always sing along, usually with petra for some reason.


like most british people, there are some things about the way americans misuse the english language that annoy me more than others. one thats right up there on my list is using the verb-phrase "waiting on" to mean "waiting for". all right-thinking people know that waiting on someone means serving them food in a restaurant whilst waiting for someone means being in a place until they are also in that same place.

sometimes you wait for something in vain - but if it was truly worth waiting for it was worth the risk that in might never happen.
you have to know whether to give up and go home though

"not my idea" - garbage

"this is not my idea of a good time"



im a big fan of the novel the wrong boy by willy russell. sure some of the plot twists are just a little too far fetched - though many things in life just arent coincidences - but the characters are vivid and at times it has a feel of the philosphical novel about it - trying to find subtle artistic ways to expound ideas.
the idea that most stuck with me from the novel is the grandmother's insistance that she didnt want to have fun. fun is little but meaningless distraction from problems and never more than short term. what she wanted in her life was joy. a powerful, deep, meaningful undercurrent of joy in which problems can been seen in context and moved past, rather than trying to extend islands of joy out into a sea of despair - reclaiming them through hard work like holland.

i like to think that my idea of a good time is not rooted in fun but in joy

"pearl's cafe" - the specials

"its all a load of bollocks"


the first couple of times i heard this song i enjoyed it without really getting it, catching the chorus and kind of accepting that as the core of the song. it wasnt until several listens later that i realised what a sad tale jerry dammers had spun. firstly the sadness of compassion for someone whose life has been tough, then secondly the sadness of realising his girlfriend is a heartless bitch. and theres a bouncy keyboard solo. the release date of this song makes it almost exactly as old as me. things really dont change.


in finnic mythology a goddess called (i think) ilmatar is sleeping lonely in the middle of a vast ocean when a giant duck with shining eyes builds its nest upon her knees, laying two eggs. when ilmatar wakes up she knocks this nest over and the eggs spill and break, forming the earth and the rest of the universe from the pieces by doing so.
its all a load of bollocks.

"the jeep song" - the dresden dolls

"i try to see it in reverse. it makes the situation hundreds of times worse when i wonder if it makes you want to cry every time you see a light blue volvo driving by"


it still shocks me that the dresden dolls arent huge. maybe not pop huge, but certainly indie huge. theyre both scarily talented musicians, their songs are intense and beautiful, amanda is a good looking lady with an original look - surely thats the right set of ingredients and then some.

i woke up this morning with this song in my head and its still there 6 hours later. its a catchy beast - particularly the sweary bits.

there are some cars that i instantly associate with people - beat up old red fiat pandas with jack, for example - some with events - small blue fords with trying in vain to get a whole band and all their gear through carmarthenshire in one - and some with times in my life - any of the increasingly few occasions i see a morris marina will always remind me of my childhood when it was our family car.

i'm pretty certain noone associates me with a car - since i've never owned one and since my wife's estate is useful but unremarkable - but i wonder what people do associate me with. might there be things that people see and are always reminded of me or a situation involving me? i'd like to think it was something cool and musical - cheap, heavily-customised guitars and gear for example - or something quirky - like silver body paint or stripy purple tights - or maybe even something meaningful, but i suspect if anyone does associate me with anything its something rubbish. thats the thing about other peoples memories - theyre so hard to alter.

Fedde Le Grande - "Put your hands up for detroit"

"a lovely city"

This song always makes me think of my favourite blog pinkisthenewblog.com
Its writer, Trent, is from Detroit (although he lives in LA) and often talks about it. As much as I like reading about his personal life though, I prefer Trent's rants on Celeb World. He was the first one to know about Britney and Fed-ex!! Well, if he wasn't the first one to know, at least I read about the divorce on PITNB waaaaay before everyone (at least the night before). He likes Britney, Jake Gyllenhaal and Madonna and lets it be known! There are other celebs whom (which?) he slags off in a gentle but hilarious way. I don't agree with him on certain things (I'm in Team Jennifer!!) but I like the way he writes, it makes me smile and sometimes laugh. I also follow quite closely his relationship with his boyfriend David, I think they're really cute together. My dream is to have one day my name and pic on the blog (as a fan, not a celeb!), but I don't have any friends who know of PITNB with whom to take themed pictures!

If you're a fan and you read this, get in touch.

That's it. I'm out.

"in the navy" - the village people

Following some joke from my French family after my boyfriend explained his grand-parents had met in the navy, the chorus stuck in my head for a while. I only know the words from the title - no idea what the rest says.

It made me think of this picture:

"st thomas" - sonny rollins

my baby girl loves st thomas. ive known it turn her from a screaming ball of grumpiness into a giggling tiny dancer. it might not be specific for this tune - it could just be a good example of an upbeat, accessable tune with interesting rhythms - but i like to think shes developing good taste at her very young age. im probably fooling myself - but to those of you who are doubting (not unlike st thomas himself) i would ask you to give her the benefit of your doubt until she is proved to just be responding to my enthusiasm or some other theory

"saltwater towns" - monsters4GODS / sultry lemon

"we fade in and out of our saltwater towns with gardens of dreams and temples of sound"


the earworm is specifically the sultry lemon recording of this song about 70% of the time, but occasionally lapses into a more familiar m4G arrangement.


i think i'd hate to live at the seaside. i cant see what attraction all the retired people see in it. i can see how it would make more sense in a climate where there is a higher proliferation of scantily clad lovelies, but i can see those on the interweb any time i like and i dont think even that would outweigh the negatives. now i realise the cynic would argue that i lived at the coast, but swansea is more a city that happens to be next to a beach, and to me doesnt really count as the seaside. it doesnt exist to pander to holidaymakers and daytrippers. its not a depressing economic wasteland the coldest 8 months of the year. it could never be described as a resort. these are the thingsthat i associate with the seaside. swansea does share some of the other drawbacks though - such as seagulls, constant wind and the sand that gunks up the bearings on your skateboard.

"for the birds" - the juliana hatfield three

"if had wings, i’d try to fly. but they don’t make it harder to die. you can take it up to the sky, but no-one ever stays that high."


i absolutely adore beome what you are. i love juliana's voice on it, i love the guitar sounds and overall feel, and its full of songs i have to battle myself hard not to rip off when im writing. i cant believe it was released half my life ago when it still sounds so fresh to my ears - albeit that it is very much in and of the time. i hold my hands up to being a grunge casualty, so my opinion is far from biased, but so many fantastic albums were made around that time - yet this is song is from one of the standouts.


it was stupidly blustery, with trees shaking to such an extent that all kinds of things were falling out of trees onto the ground. no nests, obviously, because of the time of year, and actually mostly stick and twigs and things but i also saw several trees shaking themselves free of rubbish that had been caught in their branches like a dog emerging from a filthy pond. its been a day for looking up because you never know what flying objects you may have to avoid. i dont think i look up often enough.

"noises for the leg" - the bonzo dog doo dah band

"i found the men sir. God i wish i hadn't"



on a night when the act of getting to sleep proves more difficult a challenge than it has any right to, the last thing you need in your head is a cycling 24 bars of sinister vaguely oom-pah-esque saxophone bottom end honking topped by a theramin rendition of tortured screaming.
its not exactly guaranteed to be relaxing and restful.
it must have soundtracked some fairly warped dreams since each of the many times i woke it was still in my ears.

"rollercoasting" - helen love

"i got the mc5, suicide, nancy sinatra and neil young live, i got heavenly, peggy lee, captain beefheart and the vaselines"


some sage advice, dear reader - if you move to a city because someone you would like to meet lives there and there is the incredibly remote chance of you bumping into them you are only fooling yourself. it just wont happen. the odds are stacked against you in an overpowering way. even in a small city.

unless you take up stalking, of course, in which case you may be able to see the person every day by camping outside their home and following them up to the limits of your restraining order. thats if you can find out where they live - many people you would like to meet are known by a different name or are ex-directory.

ive never tried stalking - except a little bit on the interweb - but im pretty certain i would be rubbish at it. it takes far too much application.

"young crazed peeling" - the distillers

"are you ready to be liberated?"


theres something about the way brody screams those words that really moves me to want to care (theres also something about brody's arse in those stripey trousers in the drain the blood video that moves me in an entirely other way - but thats another story).

the best thing about the question is its use of the passive voice. too often revolutionaries ask if you are ready to liberate yourself, or be part of a movement to liberate each other, or even to liberate someone else, but brody is offering to liberate me without any effort on my part. sure i need to prepare myself to be liberated, though the implication is only that the liberation process will be easier and go much more smoothly if i am properly prepared. theres enough passion in that question to make me believe that brody is quite prepared to liberate me, whatever my state of preparation. it is the "coming ready or not" that marks the end of the seekers countdown in hide and seek. it is the "brace, brace" over the aeroplane tannoy. its that glance that butch and sundance exchange just before that final futile shootout.

to be honest, brody, im not really very ready to be liberated, but im sure ill cope when you decide the time is right to liberate me.

The Bounty Kitchen Paper Song

"Use, rinse, rinse, rinse, use"

Have you ever seen the Bounty Strictly Come Dancing spoof advert? I saw it yesterday evening at a friend's house and the "use, rinse, rinse, rinse, use" refrain stuck in my head for ages...

Even as we went to see Lukas Moodysson's latest film, it was still there, playing in my head and coming out of my mouth, annoying my friends. It only stopped when the film started.

What can I say about "Container"? That there was 6 of us in the cinema, and one person walked out. That none of my three friends liked it. That it was a succession of black and white images, to the soft, monotonous sound of actress Jena Malone's voice. That it was both beautiful and horrible. Shocking and inspiring. Poetic. It reminded me of "the love song of J. Alfred Prufrock".

"suddenly i see"/"sunday shining" - kt tunstall/finlay quaye

"she makes me feel like i could be a tower, a big strong tower yeah"
"i'm a hero, like robert de niro"


sometimes a couple of bits of songs remind you of each other so much that hearing one in your head makes you think of the other which you then hear in your head which makes you think of the first one again. round and round. this is the power of the double earworm.


it also brought back a strong memory of drinking vodbenas (a shot of vodka with a shot of neat squash as a chaser) with crissie in bar-boon. im not even sure if thats something that literally happened or a fictional composite of memories. an awful lot of drinking went on at that bar and in slightly hazy retrospect the sessions tend to blend a little. i knew crissie well enough to know she was awesome, but i wish i knew her well enough to say i knew her. i do know she is nothing like kt tunstall or robert de niro though - so maybe im associating with the strength of her figurative tower.



though i have always suspected that that line of lyric has a phallic undertone

"i begin to wonder" - danii minogue

"and i-i-i begin to wonder"


2 girls on my train were listening, at a volume that seriously distorted on their mobile phone's tiny speakers with every pounding bass note, to some androgynous-voiced r'n'b singer's pseudo-romantic whinings and singing along in between their equally loud conversation. i think between them they totalled about 40% of the notes in tune and the guy's [i think] top range was well beyond them, but there was something about their enthusiasm for this aural drivel that was infectious and a tiny snatch of it stayed with me.

as is so often the case with things you really dont know and didnt hear well enough to have any grasp on becoming earworms, it quickly mutated into something vaguely similar that i did know better, though not really in this case because it is significantly better.

"little sunflower" - freddie hubbard

standing on the platform of blackfriars station, staring down the thames towards tower bridge and the rolling hills of se16 beyond, the wintery wind whipping off the water and through my hair with this tune in my head.

for some reason i have never been able to fathom, this tune always reminds me of jacqui, whom i have never met and only know through cohabiting a discussion forum. our greatest bond was that sick determination with which we clung to the last tattered fragments of a once-vibrant community right up until we finally had to give it up as dead. ive had no contact with her in months, i wouldnt even know how, and to be honest ive rarely spared her a thought, but every time i hear this tune i remember something clever, or funny, or bitchy or just plain relevant and necessary that she contributed and it makes me smile.

nirvanaweb is dead - long live all the former nirvanawebbers in whatever it is they do now

"desperate guys" - the faint

"you were warming the bass up, your hair covered your face up, i was acting indifferent at the merch booth putting on make-up"



for a brief period about a year ago i was a bit obsessed with this song. i first heard it on xfm walking home from the train station at night after a jazz workshop. the snatch of lyric above almost literally stopped me in my tracks - even with its dodgy scansion and not-quite-as-clever-as-it-first-appears word play i just found it so evocative. theres a sort of swagger to this song that is strangely aspirational. and those ridiculous string samples. and that squelchy bass riff.
as i write its been in my head for the last five and a half hours. its that kind of song. i recommend anyone to listen to it, but only if theyre prepared for the earworm consequences.


i was never that cool, but i did at least used to be cooler than i am now. acting indifferent. putting on make up.

"mental dreamers' club"

"sina olet hyvin kaunis
porquoi est-ce que je revais
ces sentiments? about to drown this
time in words my conscious mind cant say"


this was a song i started writing for someone else at a time when i barely managed to finish anything i started , so its little surprise i let her down. one day i'll finish writing it, and one day after that i'll make her sing it.
if i can ever remember what its supposed to say

"here is what i dreamed" - mike keneally

"then i was jostled by police to hand my wallet over"



the strange, zappa-esque, mildly self indulgent hat album has been in my cd rack for some time and i'm not entirely sure how and why i came to own it. im pretty certain i wouldnt have bought (or even lifted) a cd by someone i've still never heard of in any other context, i dont think i know anyone who would have lent it to me for me to forget (deliberately or otherwise) to give it back, and its not something most people would give as a present. but however it came into my life, its an album i fairly regularly rediscover having forgotten it and there are some real gems on it.


i was reminded of this song, with its bizarre narrative of repeatedly being stopped by the police who gradually steal everything he owns, when i saw 3 policemen pushing a young black guy against a wall. despite his protests, he had the resigned look of someone to whom this happened a lot. its ages since ive been stopped by the police, but when i used to walk home alone late at night a lot it was fairly regular. i felt a strange, if fleeting, sense of solidarity for the guy, and then i started to think that maybe hed actually done something to warrant this treatment which made me worry about the moral implications of siding with a criminal.
before id had time to think about it much though, i had walked past the situation and away, got distracted trying to remember the lyrics to the earworm and forgotten everything else.