I've Got A Little List

Following the great tradition, established all of a year ago (shame I didn't think of it earlier) here's a list of all the songs and lyrics I used as the titles of posts in 2018. Last year I put them all on a YouTube playlist. This time there are a few I'd rather not admit to in public.

Instead, I thought I'd do it as an old-school list, the kind we used to do all the time back in the APAzine scene of the 1980s, with explanatory notes and comments. They were ubiquitous then. People sometimes felt they had to aplogize for relying on them. It was seen as lazy in certain quarters.

Compiling this lot, I have to say, felt like the opposite of laziness. It was a lot of work but very enjoyable. With the technology we take for granted now, which would have seemed like science fiction then, every song title goes to a video, just because it can. A few are NSFW but it's the holidays and no-one's at work, so let's live dangerously.

Take it away!

Touch My Stuff (You Can Die)   -   Beachbuggy. A longtime favorite of Mrs Bhagpuss.
Inbetween Days   -   The Cure. Ditto.
I Wish   -   Skeelo. One of the few - the very few - titles to receive a comment.
I'm Gonna Buy Me A Dog   -   The Monkees. This Davy Jones version predates it, too.
Waiting For The End Of The World   -   Elvis Costello and The Attractions. Fantastic keyboard  work from Steve Nieve. I used to like Elvis a lot but he's blotted his copybook so many times over the years it's hard to remember why.
Gold!   -   Spandau Ballet. I wish I could say I was thinking of this by Prince when I came up with that one but I really wasn't.
Please Let Me Come Mooch Round Your House   -    The Lovely Eggs. I pretty much wrote the post just so I could use that title.
Get Lucky   -   San Cisco. Daft Punk cover. There are several fantastic versions, not least this by Daughter. The original is, of course, sublime, but San Cisco's is my favorite of them all.
Love Plus One   -    Haircut 100. The post title was "Where do we go from here?" although the lyric is actually "Where does it go from here?" As we will see, I have pronoun issues. The answer, by the way, is "Down to the lake, I fear" !
Can I Kick It?   -   A Tribe Called Quest. Post title was "Can I Click It?" I freakin' love daisy age hip-hop. A friend of mine, dead now, made me a mixtape once with this on it. He called it "Can I Kick Lou Reed?", which is a thought most of us must have entertained at one time or another.

Perfect Blue   -   Lloyd Cole and The Commotions. All-time favorites of mine. Lloyd can do no wrong on record although he's not much live.
Pirate Love   -   The Heartbreakers. Amazing footage from CBGBs with Richard Hell on bass. How did we even live before YouTube?
Trash   -   Suede. I can't remember now, whether I was thinking of this or the New York Dolls number. They're both superb so I guess it doesn't matter.
Up The Hill Backwards   -    David Bowie. Definitely not one of my favorites of his.
Odds And Ends   -   Susan Cowsill and Brian Henneman. Originally by The Band. Post title was taken from the chorus, Lost Time Is Not Found Again, which Bob himself presumably took from Proust. To my surprise there's no sign of The Band's version on YouTube but the pick of the covers is this one, featuring Susan Cowsill from The Cowsills, who's just a year younger than me!
Drive, She Said   -   Stan Ridgway. I do like me some Stan although the idea most likely came to me from the movie (Drive He Said). There actually is a movie called Drive She Said but I only discovered that when I was researching this list. It looks pretty good, too. One thing I do know, I certainly wasn't thinking of the band of the same name. They're awful!
Opportunities   -   The Pet Shop Boys. Neil Tennant looks about twelve here.
Honey Trap   -   Best Youth. I have an unwritten list of titles I want to use just so I can link to the songs because they're so good. This was on it.

Already Home   -    Alex The Astronaut. And so was this.
Who Does Lisa Like?   -   Rachel Sweet. Storming version, backed by Fingerprinz, with Rachel's voice sounding like it could cut sheet steel. The post title was "What Does Lisa Like?" but let's not argue over a pronoun.
A Crow Will Remember Your Face   -   Silver Servants. This wins the prize for most obviously shoehorned-in post title of the year. Could have sworn there was a video...
Off To The Races   -   Lana Del Rey. I worship Lana. She's probably my favorite singer/songwriter of all time now. New Years Resolution:  get Lana into more post titles.
Putting Out Fire With Gasoline   -   David Bowie. And Georgio Moroder, as if you could miss him. I wasn't so keen on this when it first came out but it's aged very well.
Picture This   -   Blondie. This hasn't. It's a lot more plodding than I remembered it. Great lyric though.
Long Distance Runaround   -   Yes. I thought long and hard before I used this title for a post. Did I really want to out myself as a Yes fan? Does anyone? The second gig I ever went to, aged about thirteen, was Yes. They opened with the whole of Tales from Topographic Oceans, all 80 minutes of it, and it hadn't even been released yet so no-one had ever heard it before. It's a wonder I ever went to another gig after that...
Read It In Books   -   Echo And The Bunnymen. Makes you want to wear a greatcoat, doesn't it?
This Used To Be The Future   -    The Pet Shop Boys. With Phil Oakey from The Human League. I'd never heard this until this year. Great slideshow video but the comment section's a bit off-message, to put it mildly.

Shellshock  -    New Order. The post was called "Never Enough", which was what I remembered the song being called, too. Typical New Order trick.
Don't Sit Down Cos I've Moved Your Chair   -   Arctic Monkeys. I kind of missed out on Arctic Monkeys when they were the Next Big Thing so I'm coming at them from behind, so to speak. The new album is just wonderful.  
Ain't No Mountain High Enough   -    Marvin Gaye and Tammi Terrell. I really don't have much to say about this, other than they both died too soon. Especially Tammi.
World In My Pocket   -   Nyck Caution Feat. Joey Bada$$.  You couild fit what I know about contemporary hip-hop into one of those five-slot bags that drop in GW2 starting areas. I know a good tune when I hear one though.
Purple Haze   -   The Cure. Well, now... this is embarrassing. Turns out I used Purple Haze twice this year, once in its own right and once as a tweaked lyric (Excuse Me While I Scorch The Sky). I didn't realize until I was compiling this list and what's more I never liked the song in the first place.
That Joke Isn't Funny Any More   -   The Smiths. Or as I had it, This Joko Isn't Funny Any More. Neither is Morrissey, for that matter.
Summertime Sadness   -   Lana Del Rey. Here in the shape of a great cover by Miley Cyrus. I love Lana covers. They emphasize just what a magnificent songwriter she is. Miley gives it a hard edge that's almost scary.

Roll Your Own   -   The Fabulous Poodles. I saw The Fab Poos play in a deconsecrated church, not two miles from where I'm sitting,  around the same time this video was recorded. They were very funny. Pub rock really hasn't aged well, though, has it?
I Am Always Touched By Your Presence, Dear   -   Blondie. Or as I so wittily had it, "Presents". Why is it Debbie Harry always looks as though she'd rather be anywhere else? I saw Blondie on their first UK tour, supporting Television. I'd be hard put to say who was the more wooden, although I did literally fall asleep during one of Tom Verlaine's interminable guitar solos...
Something Changed   -   Pulp. God, I miss the 90s.
I, Me, Mine   -   Elliot Smith. I'm not much of a Beatles fan. I was very wary of using this as a post title but I checked beforehand to make sure there was a cover I could live with. I'm not much of an Elliot Smith fan either, come to that but at least his version's short.
Give Him A Great Big Kiss   -   The Shangri-Las. The post title - He's Good-Bad But He's Not Evil - comes from one of those fantastic spoken exchanges the Shangri-Las made their own.
What's So Funny 'Bout Peace, Love And Understanding?   -    Brinsley Schwarz. Better known in versions by Elvis Costello, Bruce Springsteen, Sherryl Crow... Even Puddles Pity Party has more views. The original, featuring Nick Lowe, who wrote it, is still the best.
Psychokiller   -   Talking Heads. I toyed with The Ukelele Orchestra Of Great Britain and the recent version by DJ Sneak & Charlie Sputnik but of course, when I wrote the post, which was called "You're Talking A Lot But You're Not Saying Anything", I was only thinking of Talking Heads, so let's go with that.
New Age   -   Shilpa Ray. Like Shilpa, I discovered The Velvet Underground when I was very young. Changed everything, really. The song starts around 4.18 but the pre-amble is illuminating. The post was called "It's The Beginning Of A New World". Rachel Sweet did a great cover of this one, too.

Long Summer Days   -   EMF. Did I mention I miss the 90s? Shame about the sound quality but worth it to see the boys in their full "glory".
Walking My Cat Named Dog   -   Norma Tanega. I reversed the order of the species for the post, for reasons that kind of made sense at the time. I only discovered Norma Tanega a couple of years ago. How did we even live before YouTube? Wait, did I say that already?
Head Full Of Steam   -   The Go-Betweens. I was criminally negligent when it came to Antipodean bands in the 80s. I'm making up for it now. I actually came to the Go-Betweens via Robert Forster's son's band, The Goon Sax, who I just love. I'm sure that would please both of them.
My Emptiness   -   Ciudad. Everyone knows about Japan and Korea but there are vibrant  indie scenes in China, Indonesia, and The Phillipines, where this lot come from, too. How did we even... okay, okay, I won't say it!
Resurrection Shuffle   -   Ashton, Gardner and Dyke. They don't make 'em like this any more. Thank god.
East Goes West   -   The Panthers. Nine minutes of 1960s Bollywood psychedelia. Sounds like at least three different records welded together. See that Radio 6? I could do that.
Days Like This   -   Van Morrison. Everyone's at their best on Letterman. Even Van.
Ice Cream For Crow   -    Captain Beefheart. While we're on the subject of difficult f*ckers...
Soft Kitty   -   Mayim Bialik.  Or Blossom, as I always think of her. Schnurrt, schnurrt, schnurrt.

Brass In Pocket   -   The Pretenders. 1980 going on 1970 going on 1958. Sounds better now than it did then.
World Shut Your Mouth   -   Julian Cope.  I was standing about three feet away from him once, while he was swinging abround on that bizarre mike stand. It was very distracting.
Missing   -   Everything But The Girl. The Todd Terry remix, natch. I loved The Marine Girls but EBTG were hit and miss, I thought. I read Tracy's memoir earlier this year. She doesn't seem to enjoy herself much. This is a great lyric, though. Her words look surprisingly strong on the page, unlike most songs.
The New World   -   X.  I used the full album title, More Fun In The New World, which couldn't have been more on point for the piece in question. Surprisingly mainstream rock for a band of X's pedigree, I thought. Good, just the same.
Disconnected   -   Camp Claude. What a shouty crowd. Sounds like they were having a great time but I'd rather hear the band. I guess I could upload the studio version since I have the album...
Shutterbuggin'   -    Buck 65. There are two remixes of this on YouTube (Aetoms and Emancipator) and they're both superior to the original but only the official version has a video and it's a good one. Buck's more of a performance poet than a rapper, I'd say, although I wouldn't say it to his face.
Memories Can't Wait   -   Talking Heads. The lyric I used for a title was "There's A Party In My Mind" although looking back at the post it's hard to figure out why. The title of the song itself would probably have made more sense but until I looked it up just now I had no idea what it was. My head is full of fragments of songs but I don't have an index.
Clothes, Friends, Photos   -   Peter and Kerry. "I know that I have got to let you go. Because I feel like I’m Ted Hughes and you’re Sylvia, and I’m dragging you down". I mean, come on! Heartbreaking. There's a good live version where they look like they were just voted "Cutest Couple in Cuteland" for the third year running. They were The Guardian's New Band of the Week in December 2012 when their first album came out and as far as I can tell they haven't recorded anything since.

Pictures On My Wall   -   The Mad Scene. Another Echo and the Bunnymen tune, which is where I know it from and where I borrowed the title. I prefer this 90s cover. I had no idea who The Mad Scene were until I googled them thirty seconds ago to find they featured someone from The Clean and someone else from The Go-Betweens. No surprise it's better than The Bunnymen, then!
Maybe Someday   -   Teen Hearts. There's a Cure song of the same name but I was actually thinking about this pop-punk banger. There's some weird part of me that's eternally lost in a fug of suburban adolescence. You're just lucky there's no emo on this list. Maybe someday.
Santa's Got A Brand New Bag   -   SheDaisy. I absolutely was not thinking of this when I used the post title "Brand New Bag". I literally just discovered it this minute, as I was searching for the song I thought I meant, "Brand New Bag" by Lloyd Cole and The Commotions - which turns out not to exist. I realise now that I'd conflated two of my favorite Commotions singles, "Brand New Friend" and "My Bag" to make an entirely bogus song. Oh well, it's Christmas, so what the heck.
Rocket Roll   -   Zolar X. Glam punk from outer space! Post title was "Go-Go-Go-Go Go Rocket Roll-Roll-Roll-Roll", which just about says it all.
Going Back   -   Dusty Springfield. A Goffin/King composition, covered by everyone from The Byrds to Freddie Mercury but by no-one better than Dusty.  Post title was "I Think I'm Going Back".
Ashes To Ashes   -   David Bowie. It's that man again. There's an astounding range of covers of this online, everyone from Celine Dion to Lamb of God. Hard to see why. You're really on a hiding to nothing, covering something like this. Best leave well alone.

And that's all the song titles and lyrics I used in 2018. But... 

I also used a few band names and album titles! May as well have those, too. I'll just pick a track entirely not at all at random...

That Dog   -   Never Say Never. From a TV Show that looks like it came from another planet, let alone another decade.
Swell Maps   -   Read About Seymour. There doesn't seem to be any live footage of this incredibly influential post-punk ensemble (Pavement, Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr., REM, Nirvana and Stereolab all cite them as an influence). The two brothers, Nikki Sudden and Epic Soundtracks (not their real names - oh, you guessed...) both went on to make a host of great records before they died, separately, far too young. I guess Phones Sportsman and Jowe Head might still be around.
Slow Club   -   Disco 2000. I don't like Slow Club. They always seem like the kind of band I ought to like but I just don't. I thought several times about the wisdom of using the name for a post title but it just fitted too well not to. This is a really horrible cover of a great Pulp song but it's still better than any of their own dirges.
Pony Pony Run Run   -   Walking On A Line. I have a theory that any band with "Pony" in the name is always going to be worth a listen. Having Pony twice doesn't make you twice as good, though. Or good at all, necessarily.
Ourselves The Elves   -   Cincinatti Clocks. I love this. Love love love it!. You wouldn't believe how many times I've tried to come up with a way to work "Cincinatti Clocks" into the title of a post about MMOs. Finally had to admit it was never going to happen. The band name, though, that's a gimme.
Pictures At An Exhibition   -   Emerson, Lake and Palmer. If I thought hard about Yes, imagine what went through my mind when I pulled the trigger on this. I suppose I could claim I meant the Mussorgsky but I was in fact channelling my fourteen-year old self. He had a lot to learn. I still like Yes. ELP, not so much. Or, indeed, at all. And if anyone's made it all the way to the end I strongly advise not clicking on that final link. It goes to a full live version of the entire album and I refuse to be responsible.

Thank you and good night!