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| Tue Sep 21 2004 |
Desert Island Discs |
We've asked asked Anne if she could give us 10 records she would take with her on a desert island. She gave us 17!
Here they are :
ROXY MUSIC - ROXY MUSIC
Whilst most of the other kids at school were getting down to The Osmonds and David Cassidy, I'd discovered the delicious Eno, posing between the covers of the self-titled first Roxy Music album! Not only had I discovered a new kind of "teen idol" there, I'd also discovered a whole new kind of music! These bizarre but beautiful guys and their equally bizarre and beautiful music....What were these strange electronic-but-somehow-organic sounds?....How on earth did Bryan Ferry achieve that spine-tingling vocal?....Paul Thompson's hypnotic drums! Those drums inspired me to take a trip down to the "Swap Shop" behind the old market in Croydon and buy a battered second hand drum kit (much to my parent's delight!).
If you can only check out one track on this album, make it "If There Is Something".
HERE COME THE WARM JETS - ENO
Roxy Music became bigger and bigger and I kept an eye on them through the music magazines of the time. It soon became public knowledge that Bryan Ferry and Brian Eno were having "artistic differences" (and probably a few ego problems too!).
After the release of their second album Eno left and I waited with eager anticipation for his solo work. I wasn't disappointed! Whilst Roxy Music seemed to float in a universe of sci-fi cocktail music, Eno was developing a whole new sound.
Here Come The Warm Jets was so innovative! Pre-empting so much of what was to come later on in the 1970s. There are so many different kinds of energy condensed into this amazing recording!
TAKING TIGER MOUNTAIN BY STATEGY - ENO
A year later Eno released Taking Tiger Mountain...Crazy lithographic cover...crazy titles "Burning Airlines Give You So Much More" , "Back In Judy's Jungle", "The Fat Lady Of Limburg", even madder lyrics! Not a regular pop music release! A guest performance by the Portsmouth Sinfonia - a rather unique orchestra!
Anybody who is an admirerer of Eno's will tell you about "Third Uncle"....
It's "Rock n Roll" Jim - but not as we know it!!!
ANOTHER GREEN WORLD - Eno
Yet another Brian Eno album.
It is impossible for me to choose just one album by him. His influence on me has been enormous.
When people used to argue that "electronic" music lacked feeling, I would play them this beautiful, beautiful record.
Not only does it soak me in emotion but provides the most exotic and rich visual images - always important for a writer!
THE MAN WHO SOLD THE WORLD - DAVID BOWIE
It wasn't until I'd started doing voluntary work at Cane Hill Hospital and until after I'd discovered The Man Who Sold The World that I found out David Bowie's brother was a patient. How strange! I thought how tracks on the album could have been written about the place, and sure enough, they were! Cane Hill was a dark, forboding place. The Man Who Sold The World is a dark and forboding record. Cane Hill was also though a place where I learnt about empathy and humanity. A whole new view on what it mean to be human.
David Bowie provided a whole other world of music and way of interpreting language and images. The title track contains one of my favourite ever bass lines!
ALADDIN SANE - DAVID BOWIE
More adventures in the worlds of madness and fantasy!
I loved the outrage this album caused! Bowie was always shocking people in the pre-punk 70s.
THE SLIDER - T. REX
Being 13 or 14 and seeing Marc Bolan and hearing that sexy music.... it was a real sexual awakening for me! The Slider is just one of T.Rex's many fantastic pop albums!
When he died in 1977 it was unbelievable...a bit like when Princess Diana died....Those kind of people CAN'T die ....pop stars and princesses!
TEASER AND THE FIRECAT - CAT STEVENS
Aaah! Good ol' Cat!!!
From as far back as I can remember I have loved his songs and songwriting style.
His was the first concert I ever went to! I remember my Mum got me tickets for his London show when I was 12!! My brother took me. It was magical. I was sitting high up in the balcony and I remember him just perched on a stool. Him and his guitar and his beautiful beautiful songs! Aaah!
CRIME OF THE CENTURY - SUPERTRAMP
Yes! OK! I admit to having a Supertramp album!!!!
Listening to it now.....it's still not so bad ....
Those troubled teenage years were helped a lot by this album!!!
THE ORIGINAL SOUNDTRACK - 10cc
Another band I loved for their innovative ideas.
Listening to their material all these years later I still find some of their sounds so exciting!
"I'm Not In Love"..."Wall Street Shuffle" (which isn't on this album unfortunately!).
I love the cover artwork too!
NEVER MIND THE BOLLOCKS ... HERE'S THE SEX PISTOLS - THE SEX PISTOLS
What to say???? It's all here!! The energy. The defiance. The possibilities!
I remember coming home from school and the TV was on for the evening news, which my Mum always listened to while getting dinner ready. I always watched it with nonchalant, adolescent dis-interest UNTIL the very smartly dressed, very well-educated presenter introduced a new "pop group" called The Sex Pistols! My ears pricked up and my eyes widened!...Johnny in his homosexual cowboys t.shirt and sexy leather pants! All spikes and snarls! Siouxsie in fetish gear!! - "You fucking old cunt" is the first and main thing I remember from the interview. My heart warmed!!! My Mum dropped the spoons and pans and the kitchen and in a fine Irish rage came in demanding to know what filth this was on the television!!!! (It was glorious!).
The next day the tabloids were full of outraged headlines! Someone had kicked in their TV in fury (a fine reaction-a true punk act!)...The rest is history...or last week's cover of The Independant's Arts & Review section!
HAPPY SAD - TIM BUCKLEY
Now for something completely different!
What and where to begin withTim Buckley...
Like Brian Eno, it is impossible to choose just one of his albums.
He was a god of singing and songwriting!
In all the years of knowing his work, listening to it over and over again, I never, ever tire of it. And whilst it might not appear so initially, his work too, was completely innovative and experimental.
Once again, I thank that lousy medium of television, because it was by chance I first heard/saw him on television - The Old Grey Whistle Test. I think it must have been shortly before his death, I switched on just as he began "singing" what I later discovered was "Sweet Surrender" - but that is another album and another story!
Happy Sad just drifts and pulls you gently with it through rich layers of melody, sunshine, golden light, vocal textures, musical textures, melancholy that leave me feeling beautifully stoned or like I've been caressed from head to toe! (Yes, I know - I'm getting carried away here...so I'll stop and just order you to listen to all 6 beautiful tracks - especially "Love From Room 109 At The Islander").
This album is pure bliss!
BLUE AFTERNOON - TIM BUCKLEY
Ok - so I've floated from Happy Sad to Blue Afternoon... It's the same sun-drenched crazy sadness. This music is so deep, yet seems so simple. It touches me like nothing else. What a guy! What a terrible loss.
RADIO ETHIOPIA - PATTI SMITH
Yet another artist it is impossible to measure the influence of! This time a woman!!
When I heard the her song "Piss Factory" for the first time I thought I'd died and gone to heaven! I had just been living the whole experience. The same with her first album, Horses and all her subsequent work up to Easter. this was someone READING poetry with music. Some crazy androgynous person stomping around on stage with a walking stick and neck brace (having fallen off stage in Paris a short while before!). Patti Smith was the sign post I'd been waiting for!
A NORTHERN SOUL - THE VERVE
Coming a little closer to the current time... (only a little) discovering The Verve was so energising. The raw power of the music, the poetry of the songs - they even play with William Blake. Not too many rock bands do that!
They got me buying singles again! The mixes of "On Your Own" were breath-taking! "History" - such sweet sweet pain!
LETTERS WRITTEN - MARTYN BATES
Talking of sweet sweet pain...this has to be the most beautifully melancholic album ever made.
Martyn is one of the greatest songwriters and singers ever. Period.
An album so intense it leaves you either completely devastated or completely ecstatic, depending on your emotional levels at the time!
JACQUES BREL IS ALIVE AND WELL AND LIVING IN PARIS - ORIGINAL SOUNDTRACK
Despite my inability to speak very much French, like so many people, I have been aware of Belgian songwriter Jacques Brel for all my life. He's songs were translated into English in the 1960s and sung by Scott Walker and David Bowie, amongst others.
So much work. So profound and so human.
I became even more familiar with him through my friendship with Patrik Fitzgerald, who would perform his work when we went on tour together. Through Patrik I finally discovered this wonderful album, with translations of his most famous songs and some lesser known ones too.
Anne added that this is really difficult cause it changes all the time !
Coming up are Anne's favourite books.
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Posted on Sep 21, 04 | 8:00 am
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