The Truth About Cats And Dogs

A couple of days ago, as I was making a desultory attempt to clear some of the accumulated detritus of thirty years living in the same house, I came across a large pile of CDs I'd forgotten I owned. Because I know all too well the dangers of looking closely at anything when you're trying to make space I stacked them neatly at the back of a freshly-cleared shelf without registering any of the titles or names of the bands.

Well, all bar one. I couldn't help catching sight of a CD by Broken Dog. I have no memory of buying or owning anything by anyone of that name. Not that theres's anything unusual about that. I own a myriad of things I don't remember buying.

For some reason, I had the name stuck in my mind for the rest of the day. That night in bed I typed "Broken Dog" into YouTube. Plus the word "band". I didn't want to think about what I might find myself watching otherwise. Top of the list came this, which I have to say wasn't what I was expecting:

I liked it a lot but it didn't ring any bells so I tried a few more. They were all good. I particularly enjoyed "Baby I'm Lost Without You" and Trails. Apparently they were a favorite of John Peel, albeit long after I'd stopped listening to him regularly.

I'm positive that's not how I came by the CD. I imagine I randomly bought it because I liked the band's name or the artwork on the cover. It's odd all the same because although I don't dislike dogs I'm very much more of a cat person. It's not like me to take notice of a band because they use the word "Dog" in their name. Although come to think of it Pavlov's Dog is one of my favorite bands of all time...

It got me to wondering how my preferences in companion animals might have affected my listening choices over the years. I wasn't about to go looking through my thousands of vinyl albums and singles and hundreds of CDs to tot up how many dogs make an appearance but I do have more than two thousand YouTube downloads in a 50GB file on my hard drive...

Before we see the results let's all remember one important thing: as Pony Up! explain in one of the most wonderful of their many magical numbers, The Truth About Cats and Dogs (Is That They Both Die).

It cuts off suddenly at the end which may or may not be a metaphor.

Back to the big match. And the score is... Dogs 11 - Cats 29. A conclusive win for cats.

If you include Puppies and Kittens, the revised score is...

Dogs and Puppies 12 - Cats and Kittens 36. An even more decisive win for Team Cat.

Even if you stretch a point still further and include all canines and felines, it's...

Cats (Including Tigers and Lions) 62 - Dogs (including Wolves and Foxes) 27. Foxes are a bit of a wild card, though. I tend to think of them as funny-looking cats.

So much for the team game. How about some one on one action? Sticking strictly to song titles or bands with "Cat" or "Dog" in them that I've already downloaded, here come three fights to the death. In song, that is. No cats or dogs were hurt in the making of this blog post.

First on tonight's card it's A Giant Dog vs The Family Cat. Sounds like a foregone conclusion? We'll see...

Oooh, it's a close one... The Family Cat get bonus points for bringing on Polly Harvey but A Giant Dog counter with their excellent taste in choosing a Sparks song as a cover. I think the palpable fear of the production team towards the end of the Giant Dog performance just edges it in their favor. Maybe they'd seen this version. It's not for the faint-hearted. Don't say you weren't warned.

One-nil to the dogs.

Next up another acoustic take on a crowd-pleasing favorite as The Pink Slips take on Iggy's I Wanna Be Your Dog. And in the opposite corner please welcome Kahimi Karie, covering Momus's "Cat From The Future".

Oh, boy! Another tight decision. I Wanna Be Your Dog is a notoriously difficult song to handle - just ask The Sex Pistols - but every sludge-punk-metal act seems to think they can bring something to it. They can't but The Pink Slips can. Anyone can slow a fast song down to wring out the emotion but it takes real chutzpah to slow down a slow grinder and make it pop like this.

And then there's Kahimi Karie. Even without a video this is the cat's pajamas. Momus is an underrated songwriter and Kahimi is a kitten. No, really, she is! She'll tell you so herself. In French, no less.

Kahimi takes it on a split decision. One all!

Okay, time for the decider. It's Dog Party vs Sky Cats, a mixed musical arts cage fight between the Giles sisters' hyper-kinetic Texan pop-punk and a slice of ultracool dreamwave from Reno, Nevada.

Ohhhh! And it's a surprise win for Team Dog! It may be cool for cats - and they don't come much cooler than Sky Cats' Golden Fool - but that sheer, dogged exuberance clinches it for Dog Party's "''Til Your Mine".

Well, that was unexpected. The cats were hampered by some of their best performers being out of contention due to prior appearances on this blog. Nightmare and the Cat's take on Baby's On Fire would have wiped the floor with anything on the dog team, I'm sure, although the dogs had heavy hitters That Dog and Soccer Mommy (with Your Dog) chilling on the bench.

Next time here on Inventory Full you can look forward to a tag team rematch - Foxes and Wolves vs Lions and Tigers! Place your bets now!