THE Guardian loves its ‘How we made’ articles explaining how songs came into being. Unfortunately they also remind you of acts you were not a fan of at the time. Such as these…
The Beautiful South
The song that somehow fascinates the Guardian is Rotterdam (Or Anywhere). It’s not great: blandly tuneful, with lyrics that are just a vague gripe about beautiful rich people, inspired by a hungover Paul Heaton visiting an upmarket bar in Rotterdam where the staff clearly wanted him to leave. Maybe they were worried he’d start singing Happy Hour, which is quite annoying too.
Deacon Blue
Deacon Blue plagued the charts of the late 80s with crafted, inoffensive pop tunes such as Dignity, about an ageing, downtrodden council worker who plans to buy a boat and call it ‘Dignity’. Subtle. However the real problem with Deacon Blue is that any mention of them instantly triggers a mental playback of their biggest hit, Real Gone Kid, and that ‘Hoo-woo-hoo-woo’ bit is one of the most annoying sounds created by man.
Mike + The Mechanics
It’s not surprising you’d forgotten Mike and co. because they were f**king boring. All I Need is a Miracle feels like a song written for Britain’s dads to rock out to while wielding a hedge trimmer. It’s like they’d seen the big 80s AOR hits of REO Speedwagon or Toto, and thought: ‘We could do that but without the song being memorable in any way.’ Thank God it was Toto and not them who did the music for Dune. The 1984 version has enough things to take the piss out of already.
Babybird
You’re Gorgeous is a misunderstood song about a photographer exploiting his models, but it still works as an ‘our tune’ if you’re in love with someone hot. If your partner isn’t gorgeous then cutely singing the chorus to them is just a dirty lie. They could be gorgeous in the metaphorical sense, which is presumably why uggos can get away with playing it at their weddings, but do you want to risk them taking it literally and coming home in tears because they’ve been laughed out of a modelling agency? Shame on you, Babybird.
Aswad
Aswad are British reggae pioneers whose first album came out in 1976. However the song the Guardian thinks we should be interested in the production of is Don’t Turn Around, a ‘pleasant enough’, commercial-sounding number one in 1988. It would only really be interesting if they’d gone on to form a bland pop-reggae supergroup with UB40 and Paul McCartney, but they didn’t.
Landscape
The best thing about Einstein a Go-Go is the Rocky Horror-inspired video featuring the singer as Dr Frankenstein, from an era where it wasn’t considered odd for Midge Ure to have his family wiped out in a nuclear holocaust for a pop video. Landscape’s shonky laboratory is enjoyably shite, but sadly the Lyricon electronic flute used for the main hook is quite annoying, so it remains a novelty classic rather than an actual classic. That, sadly, is what you get for playing God, Landscape.
Fairground Attraction
Folk pop should be banned under the Geneva conventions, but apart from that Perfect is not ‘bad’ in the Star Trekkin’ sense, just quite twee and saccharine. Still, you don’t have to listen to it. Except you do. It got massive airplay at the time, and its harmless, feelgood niceness gives it an enduring appeal for ‘golden oldies’ slots on radio stations. It’s like a relentlessly positive friend you fantasise about killing with a rock, even though that makes you a terrible person.
