12 Days Of Christmas – 3rd December

Hello again. A short post for you today. You may know a version of this song thanks to an advert for a certain DVD by post advert. That cover is done by a very talented Irishman called James Vincent McMorrow, who’s falsetto is remarkable. The original song is actually from 1986 by a certain Steve Winwood. The album Back In The High Life came a little out of the blue, as he hadn’t seen much success in the 80’s. It went on to get to reach the top ten both sides of the Atlantic and the song ‘Higher Love’ won him a Grammy. Click on the ‘read more’ link below to listen to the song, a great example of a really good 80’s song.

12 Days Of Christmas – 4th January

Optimash Prime sporting the Winter Collection

Only two songs left now. I know, it’s been a great journey through a bunch of songs you probably already know. But at least it’s been a fairly easy ride; nothing too pretentious or weird (I hope). For my penultimate song I’ve chosen another song from the 80’s and it’s got some good visuals too. They aren’t from the  music video though, rather from the film 500 Days Of Summer. The dance is how every man feels after getting some. Here you go, have some Hall & Oats.

#22 – Guess The Song

Here’s a first for Safety, Fun, & Learning: I am going to post a version of a song and let you figure out the original. I found this song in my music collection, and know not from whence it came, or who is responsible, but it is gold.

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https://safetyfunandlearning.files.wordpress.com/2010/12/mp3Get the song here.

Let us know how many seconds it takes for the penny to drop.

#21 – A Tongue-in-Cheek Look At The Saxophone

It’s one of those instruments that is often derided as the soundtrack to tacky porn or bad 80’s theme tunes, but today I would like to propose that the Sax is actually awesome. That’s not to say it’s not guilty of the above, just that there are better sides to it.

How about we start with a super brief summary of what wikipedia has to say. It was invented by Adolf Sax, a Belgian, in 1841. Apparently he wanted to create an instrument that sounded like the human voice. He patented it in 1846. Blah blah blah. Basically that’s all we need to know about how / when it was invented. Now on to the important stuff: why it’s worth listening to.

Obviously there are countless inspired jazz players who have made the sax famous. Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, John Coltrane and Sidney Bechet are just some names that roll off the tongue. So here’s a song by the late, great John Coltrane…

John Coltrane – Blue Train
Get the song here. Buy his music here.

Music For Horses no. 5

Grum / David E. Sugar

Rupert reporting: please listen to these two songs, it will only take 8.5 minutes of your life. Ideally make a cup of tea and drink it during this period. The first is by the electro artist Grum. I would also strongly advise  listening to the song ‘Heartbeats’ by the same artist, which is truly breathtaking, but not in-keeping with the relaxed theme of these posts. ‘La Lights’ is suitably 80’s with a really catchy chord sequence throughout. Soothing vocals and floating synth pads make this a great song to have an afternoon nap to (based on personal experience).

Grum – L.A. Lights

#4 – German Music

I felt that after such an abysmal performance in the football I would try and cheer myself up somehow. I figured a little light xenophobia and negative stereotyping would do the trick just fine, so here it is. Just before I do start generalising I want to do three things: well done Germany, you completely outplayed us in every way; England – what the hell?! I have seen League 1 teams defend better than that; and finally, Sepp, if you’re reading this, goal-line technology. Anyway, here goes…

German music. Not very good, is it?

While that should be enough, I’ll try and justify such a (frankly outrageous) statement. The impression we get of German music in the UK is that it’s stuck in the 80’s/90’s and they sing about red balloons and efficiency and other such (relatively meaningless) things. So, in the spirit of all things anti-German I thought I’d ignore the Berlin Techno scene, the quality dance music and Kraftwerk. Here are three examples of why music from the UK is better than music from Germany.

Alphaville – Forever Young

Okay, this is a bit of a cult classic (it’s in Napoleon Dynamite, don’t you know) but it’s a pretty terrible song. And it fits pretty nicely into the 80’s generalisation. Actually, I think it was written in 1979, but accuracy clearly isn’t the point of this post right now.

Silbermond – An Dich

This song is like something by Avril Lavigne, in German. If you have a look at some images of the band they’ve marketed themselves at that angst-y 13 year old girl market, with dark clothes, heavy makeup, etc, etc. For a band that have been pretty active in the ‘noughties’ (I hate that expression, but it’ll have to do) they sound horrendously 90’s. The gist I’m getting at is that they’re not very good.

Die Toten Hosen – Ich Bin Die Sehnsucht In Dir

Die Toten Hosen (also known as DTH) have been going since the early 80’s and they call themselves punk. If they were really punk they’d have got together in ’82, been signed in ’83, learned to play their instruments in ’84, had a low selling album or two in the next couple of years and been part of the legacy of punk by ’87. Instead they’re still making music. It’s like Green Day calling themselves punk. You can’t be Punk after a 30 year career making insane amounts of money. It’s simply not Punk.

There you go. Three examples of why, in spite of having been schooled in the football, England is better than Germany! 😀