UK – Page 11

Howard Jones | Hide and Seek

UK native songwriter/performer Howard Jones’ career blossomed with his signature single, “Things Can Only Get Better.” That uptempo tune, which acknowledges life’s complexities but maintains an infectiously positive attitude, seems to have set the tone for Jones’ career. From a 2022 interview with 48Hills: “‘From the first album, the first single, I wanted the music and the lyrics to be of use to people to help them get through difficult times in the same way that music helped me. It had been such a comfort and an inspiration to me as I was growing up … I was consciously writing the music for the times when people, including myself, needed a boost, to get over some really difficult situation that life is constantly throwing at us … we need everyone on this planet to be functioning at their highest, most positive level if we’re going to overcome the difficulties we’re facing.'”

“Howard looks at the big picture in this song, where he goes back to the big bang and asks us to remember a time when there was ‘nothing at all, just a distant hum,'” (Songfacts). “Howard Jones performed ‘Hide and Seek’ at Live Aid in 1985 on Freddie Mercury’s piano.” Stepping the tempo up noticeably compared to the studio version of this ballad, Jones somehow gathered the courage to perform this track solo at the piano amidst Live Aid’s otherwise saturated aural textures and huge bands. The transatlantic concert was witnessed by 70,000+ audience members in London and 80,000+ for the US set; “an estimated audience of 1.9 billion, in 150 nations, nearly 40% of the world population” viewed the broadcast on TV or listened via radio (CNN).

After an intro and a verse in D minor, the chorus lifts the mood with a shift to D major (first heard from 1:52 – 2:23) before reverting to the hook-driven minor interlude and verse. The connective tissue in the transition from minor to major is a prominent Dsus4.

Pretenders | Mystery Achievement

“Like (the Clash album) London Calling, Pretenders came out in the U.K. in 1979 and here in the U.S. in 1980,” (Medialoper). “So while it’s technically a 1979 album, all of its impact — however you define that slippery term — came in 1980. Therefore, like London Calling, I really think of it as the first of the great albums of the 1980s, not the last of the great albums of the 1970s.

Which made sense: while both albums couldn’t have existed without punk rock, both albums were also signposts towards what was going to happen after punk rock, as punk rock became just one more bit of musical history upon which to draw upon when creating a sound … Kicking off with a simple, unstoppable double-time backbeat by Martin Chambers and a Pete Farndon bassline that was its own instant hook, ‘Mystery Achievement’ was hooky, dancey and fun as all hell … “

After this musical perpetual motion machine revs up in C# minor, driven by its iconic bass line, 1:22 brings an unconventional modulation to D major for the chorus. At 1:50, the key reverts to C# minor for the next verse, alternating back and forth through the rest of the tune.

Marion Ryan | Hot Diggity (Dog Ziggity Boom)

Marion Ryan, born in 1931 in Yorkshire, England, was a “popular singer with a vivacious style, was successful in the UK on records, radio, and television in the 50s and early 60s (AllMusic) … (she) first appeared on the UK music scene in 1953 and became a favourite on UK television … In the late 50s, Ryan covered several big hits, including Perry Como’s ‘Hot Diggity (Dog Ziggity Boom).'”

From The Independent: “In 1967 (Ryan) retired after a second marriage (to) the millionaire impresario Harold Davison, who handled Frank Sinatra. … Ryan’s personality may be gauged by her entry in the 1962 Radio Luxembourg Book of Record Stars. ‘Pet likes: lounging casually at home. Pet hates: rude, loud, ill-mannered people. Favourite food: Chinese. Hobbies: reading.'”

The carnival-like instrumentation of “Hot Diggity” (1956) somehow provides no competition for Ryan’s confident vocals. At 1:29, a half-step modulation kicks in.

Aretha Franklin | Border Song

“Border Song” was written by Elton John, appearing on his 1970 eponymous album. Aretha Franklin offered a gospel-tinged version, stretching the melody to new places.

“The song was one of the first Elton John singles released in March 1970. It featured John’s vocals, his strong piano performance, plus a generous gospel-style chorus,” (PopHistoryDig). “However, the song did not chart in the UK. In North America a few months later, it did better. In Canada, it peaked at No. 34, and thereby became Elton John’s first chart appearance in any country. In the U.S., meanwhile, during October 1970, the song broke into the Billboard Hot 100 at No. 92, and No. 69 on the Cash Box chart. But good news on the song was soon to come from another quarter.

… Aretha Franklin decided in 1970 that she wanted to do a cover version of ‘Border Song.’ Aretha was 28 at the time, at the peak of her rising stardom, and involved with civil rights … Although Elton John by then had his American performance debut at the Troubadour club in Los Angeles in late August 1970, the news that Aretha Franklin would be doing a cover of ‘Border Song’ was a big affirmation for both him and Bernie Taupin … knowing what Aretha Franklin’s performance of their song would mean for their newly launched careers.”

The modulation appears at 2:12.

Beatles | Now and Then

“This single feels like a super-human attempt to re-frame the group’s ending,” critic Robin Murray wrote in Clash magazine. “Instead of rancour, unity. Instead of solo competition, studio unity. Instead of losing his friends, finding their voices once more. Maybe it’s the sentimental Beatle-maniac in us, but ‘Now And Then’ feels like something beautiful, something to cherish.”

The track, originally written by John Lennon in 1977, was finally released earlier this month, with Lennon’s voice extracted from his original demo with audio restoration technology. It quickly shot up the charts in countries across the world, and is accompanied by a music video directed by Peter Jackson featuring never-before-seen footage of the group.

The song subtly switches between A minor on the verses and G major for the choruses, with the relative majors of each key being tonicized occasionally as well.

Yusuf / Cat Stevens | Land of Free Love + Goodbye

One of the most prominent singer/songwriters of the 1970s, UK native Cat Stevens (now known as Yusuf) had many hits in the first half of that decade, releasing more than one album a year during a brief period. Just as his popularity started to wane a bit, Stevens released Numbers” … subtitled A Pythagorean Theory Tale … based on a fictional planet in a far-off galaxy named Polygor,” (from the liner notes).

“Numbers (1975) sits in a peculiar position in Cat’s back catalogue – the last real attempt at making something ‘new’ and different’ in his ‘first’ career, the last album started from scratch before his conversion to Islam and, most interestingly of all, the only real half-concept/story album in his back catalogue,” (AlansAlbumArchives). “Even when concept albums were all the range at Cat’s peak (1970-73) Cat never made an album like this one, based on one rounded theme (his songs almost always share the same theme but are separate discussions of each topic and sub-topic – he never again takes us on a half-hour journey somewhere like this again).”

After an intro in F# major, the verse tumbles into D major (0:16). At 2:25, an instrumental outro turns around a few times before landing us in B major.

Paul Young | Sordid

Let’s first establish that we’re not referring to THAT Paul Young (the vocalist with the multiple 80s pop hits — also from the UK).

Now that we’ve got that out of the way, we’ve landed in trad/folk world. “Paul (Young) has been a busy member of the Northern folk scene for a number of years now,” (Aluinn Ceiligh Band’s website). “Formerly a member of the well-known group Black Beard’s Tea-Party, he joined Aluinn shortly after their formation in 2011 and has been playing with them ever since. He also runs his own York-based band The New Fox Band. As adept on melodeon as he is on fiddle, Paul also has a busy teaching practice.” Young’s own website flips the script, emphasizing his melodeon work over the fiddle. Overall, Young’s web presence is very slim indeed, aside from his extensive Youtube videos.

Regular contributor JB adds: “In addition to stellar technique, Young is a pretty gifted songwriter. All 30 tunes in the video are his original compositions, and while there are a few clunkers, most of the tunes manage to pull off a really difficult straddle: They sound sufficiently ‘trad-adjacent’ that they could be seamlessly mixed into a set with tunes that were written 200 years ago, but are also more harmonically adventurous than 95% of trad tunes.”

After starting in A minor, Young’s “Sordid” shifts to A major at 41:26, then back to minor at 41:42, alternating onward from there. (Our apologies for the oddly huge numbers on the timeslates, but this tune is merely a small part of a much larger compilation video featuring Young’s work).

Thomas Dolby | Radio Silence

“In popular culture, the term ‘renaissance man’ can often be overused or even misused, but in the case of Thomas Dolby, the term has a lot more validity than the casual fan could ever imagine,” (PopMatters).”His (2016) memoir, Speed of Sound: Breaking the Barriers Between Music and Technology, goes a long way in making a case for Dolby to adopt this title.

In the early ‘80s, Dolby was an inescapable fixture of MTV’s playlists, with his novelty techno-pop hit ‘She Blinded Me With Science’ ruling the video airwaves and pop charts.” Setting the scene for his later career, the UK native saw early gigs by “everyone from the Clash to Elvis Costello to XTC” as a teen. He later played keyboards with the Camera Club, Lene Lovich, Herbie Hancock, and George Clinton; co-wrote and produced the first platinum 12” hip hop single, “Magic’s Wand” by Whodini; was chosen by David Bowie as the keyboardist at the UK half of Live Aid; created original music for feature films produced by George Lucas, Steven Spielberg and Ken Russell; and his keyboard work was a central feature of Foreigner’s smash hit album IV (most notably the single ‘Waiting for a Girl Like You’).

Illustrating Dolby’s bleeding-edge vantage point in terms of 1980s tech, “while riding his tour bus through the Nevada desert, (he was) forced to pull over and use a gas station phone booth as a primitive modem for uploading demo files to Michael Jackson.” Dolby was “an ‘80s pop culture Zelig, dropped into the zeitgeist with a bit of a deer-in-the-headlights attitude.” After retiring from the pop music business, he founded a company which was pivotal in the early days of the development of cell phone ringtones; served as the Music Director for TED Talks for over a decade; and is now a professor of Music for New Media at Johns Hopkins University.

“Radio Silence,” a track from The Golden Age of Wireless (1982), pivots around in terms of its tonality throughout. Meanwhile, the video treats us to a neighborhood tour of decades-old radios as we hear synthesis that was state-of-the-art for its time: retrofuturism sets Dolby’s stage here as usual. The harmonic shifts are perhaps the clearest during the outro, when the panoply of shiny synth textures has settled down a bit. 2:59 is in F# mixolydian, shifting at 3:12 to D mixolydian; the two keys alternate as the track fades.

PeakFiddler | Tam Lin (Glasgow Reel)

Regular contributor JB writes: “While the production values of this video are nothing to write home about, the musicianship is top notch. There are places where you would swear that the performer dubbed in a second violin track, but it’s a single track, with very skillful (and unobtrusive) use of double-stops and aural illusions (your ear hears a given element of a chord as continuing even when it’s not).

The same performer also recorded the guitar and banjo parts, but since he apparently views them as mere backdrops for the fiddle, he didn’t bother to use the ‘Hollywood Squares’ style of video. If you can listen to this tune without your heart rising and your pulse quickening, you’re probably deceased…”

PeakFiddler has no website, but does maintain some of the usual social media channels, all furnished with the same videos of live performance. But there’s no accompanying bio information to be found anywhere — other than that he’s “a musician living in the Northwest of England.” After a start in D minor, the tune transitions to A minor at 1:50.

Joe Jackson | Jamie G.

“In 1990, Joe Jackson had just signed a spiffy new deal with Virgin Records after spending 10 years and 11 albums under A&M,” (Popdose). “Many bands use the first album with a new label as an opportunity to make a fresh start and try new things (or, perhaps, sell out) … Jackson, however, had no interest in changing, diminishing returns be damned.”

After his 1982 album Night and Day, featuring the hit “Steppin’ Out,” was certified Gold in the UK, the US, and New Zealand and Platinum in Australia, Canada, and the Netherlands, it would likely have been difficult to achieve anything other than “diminishing returns.” But Jackson has seemed most interested in following his own muse rather than sustaining stardom, wrapping insightful and often cutting lyrics in musical styles ranging from edgy pop to jazz-inflected cabaret ballads, from textbook New Wave to uptempo salsa. “In his 1999 memoir A Cure for Gravity: A Musical Pilgrimage, Joe Jackson writes approvingly of George Gershwin as a musician who kept one foot in the popular realm and one in the classical realm of music,” (AllMusic). “Like Gershwin, Jackson possesses a restless musical imagination that has found him straddling musical genres unapologetically, disinclined to pick one style and stick to it.”

Although Jackson, a UK native, has often toured with smaller bands — at times even paring the instrumentation down to his trademark piano/bass/drums trio — this larger band format shows the effortless precision that Jackson is known for. The spirited “Jamie G.” features a late unprepared half-step modulation at 2:03.