I’ve not written anything music related for a long time, not since Ian Broudie last released something new, in fact. I went to put pen to paper about Paul McCartney’s 2018 release Egypt Station, but I pretty much felt the same as everyone else – it’s an excellent release, but the internet doesn’t need another review saying pretty much the same thing as the others. That aside, music hasn’t excited me since I was a teenager in the 1990s and truth be told, nothing has really inspired me enough to write about it. So I did write about it but it’s taken until just after the first anniversary of the album’s release to actually put it out there because of one reason or another.

So, a flashback to 2021, and I heard a song being played on the radio. Once I heard the chiming guitars I immediately stopped what I was doing and listened. That’s not happened in a long while and it was refreshing that here was something that sounded different to the vast pool of mainstream music I’ve been subjected to in the last however many years. Those guitars sounded great, but so many times I’ve heard a great intro and wanted to switch the radio off as soon as the singer opens their mouth. The singer opened his mouth with a delightfully North East twang so I had to carry on listening. I don’t pay huge amounts of notice to the lyrics on listening to something for the first time, and the first thing I thought when the full band kicked in was “he’s listened to Bruce Springsteen”. Thumpy drums, a bit of saxophone and, best of all, the glockenspiel’s nod to Born To Run. Yeah, this was something good, this was going to be big. The DJ thought so too. The song, as I’m sure you’ve probably guessed by now, is Seventeen Going Under by Sam Fender. And it even has an obligatory woah-woah refrain to get the crowd singing along at gigs and festivals, something that I did at Finsbury Park.

I heard the song a good few times, enough to be won over completely by the melody and the playing. I delved into the lyrics, realising this is pretty much an autobiography condensed into five and a half minutes. Written in lockdown whilst Sam was in isolation, it deals with toxic masculinity, teenage angst, bullying and dealing with anger. The bit that really hits home hard is witnessing in words a seventeen year old Sam Fender dealing with a situation where his Mum had to give up work for health reasons. The Department for Work and Pensions didn’t give a flying fuck and he’s willing to do anything to keep a roof over their heads. Even if it meant resorting to shady dealings with shady people. These are lyrics forthright and honest. Personal, but not giving everything away.

Getting Started seems very much Seventeen Going Under chapter two. Here we find Sam still dealing with the situation with his Mum but a year on. But the message in this song is it doesn’t matter what you’re going through, or what may be happening around you, sometimes things get too much and you need a release. Life can be overwhelming, sometimes you have to let go and let off some steam. But there’s air of optimism. Steve Van Zandt has sung this song’s praises, and my God does this song take on another dimension performed live.

Elsewhere on the album we have some observations on the current climate. Aye is a ranty fucker of a tune that engages in societal issues whilst rocking out. It shows contempt for tax dodging billionaires, and touches on the division between rich and poor, the nitpicking and squabbling between the left and right and a lack of political identity and focus. In the current political state of this country, can you find a more relatable song out there presently? See also Long Way Off, which as the title suggests, we’re a long way off from an ideal political climate and right now in 2022 this seems even more apt. We have people, old and young, struggling to feed themselves or heat their homes, and in some cases having to make a decision to eat or heat. Foodbank use is at an all time high. “The hungry and divided play into the hands of the man who put them there”

Elsewhere on the album, Sam sings about insecurities and self esteem issues. Get You Down sees Sam delving right into the past and those issues from childhood rearing their ugly heads, which end up negatively impacting and sabotaging relationships. There is also an air of defeatism on the album, as he points out what he’s got wrong or done wrong. What really strikes me is Sam’s level of self awareness in his lyrics.

Spit of You is where it really hits home, though. Many people over the years have composed a Father and Son relationship song, but none of them have come close to this and none of them have I related to more. Much like the song implies, I can talk to my Dad at great lengths about cars and music and have a laugh. Inconsequential stuff, in the great scheme of things. I can’t talk to him about feelings or anything deep. Also, politically, we’re polar opposites. My Dad was brought up in Liverpool, so talking about feelings is an alien concept for men of a certain generation, especially those that hail from the North of England. My temperament is pretty similar, too. Many times the phrase “You’re just like your old man” has been thrown my way. But I’ve seen him say goodbye to his Mum, Dad and three of his brothers, and what breaks my fucking heart is one day that will be his forehead I’m kissing. And I’ll still look exactly like him. This song gets me in the feels every damn time, so as I’m sure you can imagine, I was a gibbering wreck when I saw him perform it live in Finsbury Park. Thankfully, I wasn’t the only 40-something year old bawling their eyes out at the concert.

Crying at a rock concert didn’t stop there, either. And nor does it when I listen to this album. If you’ve not listened to Dead Boys from Sam’s first album, it’s about the male suicides that happened in his home town and struggling to comprehend it. It’s one of the best songs on Hypersonic Missiles. One of Seventeen Going Under’s finest moments is The Dying Light, which is a sequel to Dead Boys. It’s sung from the point of view of someone who wants to end it all, and indeed, it was written when Sam was at one of his lowest points. However, the song is a triumph, a will to keep going if not for himself then for “mam and Dad and all my pals” and “for all the ones who didn’t make the night”. I’ve been at this point where there seemed no way out. So has my oldest and closest friend. And some of my other close friends have had loved ones who didn’t make the night. Dead Boys stopped someone from killing themselves, and this will have the same impact. And I’d like to take this opportunity to say if you’re in a bad place, please find a friend or someone who will listen and talk to them, let them help you. And if you’ve got a mate who is in a bad place, give them a hug. Make sure they know they’re important and that they’re loved. Let them talk to you and make sure you listen to them. It’s 2022, the stigma for mental health should be banished and the lack of acceptance for men sharing their feelings should be consigned to the bin, too.

With Seventeen Going Under, Sam wears his influences on his sleeve. It doesn’t break any new ground musically, but then again it doesn’t need to. What you do get is some cracking melodies that you’ll be humming for days and worldly wise lyrics, wise perhaps beyond his years and one of the most relatable long players I’ve heard in years. But it’s not just Sam that makes the record an absolute blinder. He’s got a damn good band with him, too, and what’s refreshing is they’re not just hired hands paid to play whatever music they’re given. These lot are a bunch of mates, and Dean (Thompson, guitarist) and Drew (Michael, drums) grew up with Sam. They were probably egging the local Co-Op together, lobbing bottles of Olivio and not paying for those pesky carrier bags making the shopkeeper sod off home to cower under his sofa.

So, what’s the album like a year on? What quite often happens with albums is there’s a honeymoon period where they are played repeatedly, lose their appeal and sit on the shelf for ages. Not so with Seventeen Going Under. I can play the album now, and still do with regularity, and it still sounds as good as it did and I simply don’t tire of it. The quality of the songs and the way I can relate to them will make sure this stays a regular play for many years to come. Especially as there’s been some brilliant memories made and now attached to this record with family and friends. Albums don’t come along like this that often, but it does make me look forward to see what that canny chanter from North Shields does next. Thanks Sam, the last 12 months has been a blast and Finsbury Park was epic.

The K series engine. It’s a bit of a misunderstood and maligned beast really. Talk of it on internet forums or “daaaaaaaaan the pub” and it will it will be met by OMGHGF (Oh My God, Head Gasket Failure in internetz speakz) and OMGALLROVAZISSHIT. This is because Armchair and Pub Mechanics know more than anyone whatsoever.

True, they have their issues. Yes, some suffer from head gasket failure but the way you hear the so-called experts harp on about it, you’d think the K Series is the only engine to ever suffer from head gasket failure. Aren’t we forgetting certain VW, Vauxhall, Renault, Fiat and Peugeot engines enjoy blowing them for a past time? The garage I worked at for ten years used to look after a lot of K series Rovers. Cornwall is retirement country and there are lots of people who probably should be dead already bought these K series Rovers. I found them as reliable as anything German that we looked after, but like anything they need routine maintenance. Keep on top of them and take care of them, they’re fantastic. Caution should be applied if no maintenance has been carried out.

A brief history of the K series
It was launched in 1988, fitted to the brand new Rover R8 200 series, then later powered the 400 and the Roverised Metro that appeared in 1990. Available in 1.1 single overhead cam and 1.4 twin cam versions, but later the range increased to 1.6 litre and 1.8 as Honda began to limit supply of their engines to Rover. The K series lumps were held together as a sandwich of components using long bolts which which held the engine under compression. The 1.8 was available with a Variable Valve Control (VVC) device that allowed more power, torque and performance. The VVC unit allows some form of witch craft to happen which allows the engine to be incredibly flexible and gives it a pretty much flat torque curve. And it red lines at 7,250 rpm! Later additions included the KV6 in 2.0 and 2.5 litre, 24 valve quad cam variants. Both the K and KV6 are still in production today, following the sale of MG Rover to China corportation SAIC, though they have been revised and renamed N Series and NV6, respectively.

My K-Series
My particular K Series, pictured above, is a 1.6 16v twin cam unit fitted to a Rover 25 of varying shades of blue and black. Today it clicked over to 119,000 miles and was treated to a service, its first service since 98,000! When I bought the 25 just over a year ago it was on 103,000 miles and has pretty much been neglected ever since. But to be fair, it has wanted for nothing. Up until today, the only attention the engine has needed is a tightening of the alternator belt. The cooling system is in fine fettle and the rest of the car has fared pretty well too, needing precious little to keep it going. It has performed brilliantly and reliably – it genuinely hasn’t put a foot wrong in the time I’ve had it. It’s a revvy, peppy, responsive engine and the service it had today has made it just that little bit better. I think the K series, especially the one in my car, is a cracker.

Really, if caught in time, a head gasket is not the end of the world. If repaired properly with good quality materials used, these units will soldier on. Like all cars there’s good and bad, but I still see a heck of a lot of K series Rovers on the road. Would I buy another? You bet your bottom booby I would.

OMGALLROVAZISSHIT? I won’t hear a word of it, thank you please.

Split Enz – one of my favourite bands of all time. They’ve had some fantastic albums, songs and singles whether head of creativity were the brothers Tim and Neil Finn or original co-founder Phil Judd. Early Enz takes a few listens to appreciate, later Neil-inspired work is more melodic and immediate. Conflicting Emotions falls into the latter camp. Largely claimed to be the Enz’ poorest album release throughout their long and ever-changing career, it’s also an album I always left on the shelf and never bothered to play more than once. I’d generally play a couple of the songs that were available on the excellent “Spellbound” retrospective compilation instead and basically ignored its existence. However, when looking for something different to play in the car on a journey this was one the LPs I picked up for a spin.

Conflicting Emotions would become the final Split Enz album to feature Tim Finn, and the album title was decidedly apt. Earlier on in 1983 Tim had released his debut solo album “Escapade” to commercial and critical acclaim. With some rumoured resentment over Tim’s solo success and tensions between band members, cracks were beginning to show. Tim had kept back most of his songs for his solo album and as such saw a shift toward Neil Finn as primary songwriter. Neil had already proved himself a pretty nifty writer with hits such as I Got You, One Step Ahead and History Never Repeats. However, this album seemed to lack focus especially when compared with the fabulous Time and Tide released in 1982. It also failed to crack the Australian Top 10

None of that really came to mind when I put the disc in the CD player. The album starts off with Strait Old Line and I’d forgotten what a funky little opener that song it is, and how catchy it is. You WILL be singing it for days after. And let’s not forget that this album also contains Message To My Girl, one of Neil Finn’s finest songs ever. It’s a heartfelt love song that McCartney would probably have wished he’d written. Another Neil-penned song The Devil You Know happens to be one of my favourite songs by anyone. So with that in mind, why did I bloody ignore this album?

Simple – Tim Finn! His songs on this album are bloody rubbish. I’m used to him belting out stuff such as Charlie, Bold As Brass, I See Red and all his songs on Time and Tide are superb. That and his solo album Escapade that came out before this album is very good. But here, with the exception of the bouncy Working Up An Appetite, which is a catchy number with an interesting rhythmic beat going on, they’re nonsense. I despise the title track, especially the introduction. Bon Voyage is equally hateful, and I Wake Up Every Night is okay to a point, but the brass sounds reek of cheap Casio keyboards. Neil isn’t exactly safe from criticism either with No Mischief being rather annoying, though through repeated playing I found myself warming to it and quite enjoy it now. Same thing happened with Bullet Brain and Cactus Head. Our Day, though, is brilliant.

So, to conclude, this is one of the most frustrating albums I have in my collection. Upon fresh listening, I absolutely love just over half of it but the rest of it isn’t even good enough for B-side material. However, there is a turn of events that make me appreciate this album a little bit more. To promote the album, The Enz needed to tour and to inject a bit of life into the band they held auditions for a new drummer. They ended up hiring the bloody wonderful and very sadly missed Paul Hester. Tim left shortly after, leaving the Enz in the control of Neil. The album See Ya ‘Round was released which had no content from Tim at all, and it wouldn’t be long before Neil disbanded Split Enz. Neil took Paul with him and formed a band which would later become Crowded House. Tenuously you could say that without this album, there wouldn’t have been Crowded House. I can’t (or won’t) imagine life without Crowded House, quite frankly.

Incidentally, the album artwork was created by Phil Judd, co-founder of Split Enz who left (for the last time) in 1977.

Enjoy Strait Old Line:

Enjoy Message To My Girl:

Whilst I still have the chance to do so I shall continue my oversupply of blog writing that no-one wants to read. And for this entry I shall return to the world of music and for what I see as one of the best pop songs ever written, and for that I will accept no argument. The song – Getting Away With It by Electronic.

Electronic started out as a solo project for Bernard Sumner as he was frustrated with New Order’s lack of reception to his synth and programming ideas. Deciding not to go it alone, he but enlisted the help of Johnny Marr (The Smiths) with whom he had previously worked. Signed to Factory Records, who Sumner was already signed with New Order, the first creation of their collaboration was Getting Away With It.

It was released in 1989, a full 18 months before the debut album. It was written by Sumner, Marr and Electronic’s occasional collaborator Neil Tennant (Pet Shop Boys). Sumner and Tennant wrote the words, Sumner and Marr wrote the music. It received critical acclaim and was certainly popular, selling around a quarter of a million copies on its initial release. There were many versions of the song on a multitude of formats – different 7″ and 12″ vinyl versions and CD versions were available with remixes and instrumental takes of the song, scattered here and there. Two different videos were made, once of which you can watch at the bottom of this page. Don’t go there just yet, I haven’t finished boring you! Get back here! Thankyou.

With lead vocals sung by Bernard Sumner and backup vocals from Neil Tennant, it is quite a simple song with a piano and synthesized bass intro with live drums kicking in a moment later. Johnny Marr adds a lovely bit of understated rhythm guitar, and also gives us a rare guitar solo. The production is very glossy and is pretty typical of late 1980s/early 1990s. There’s also a full orchestra on the record, conducted by Art of Noise’s Anne Dudley. It has to be said though that the song and its sound has dated very well indeed.

It’s also got pretty dry lyrics too. As mentioned previously they were written by both Sumner and Tennant, but the story goes is that they are an attempt to parody the public persona of Marr’s old musical collaborator, good old fun-loving, smiley-smiley Morrissey.

So, we’ve established that it’s a pretty simple pop song with simple ingredients and dry lyrics. But that’s what makes it so compelling. I’ve played this song so many times since I first heard it and I have never, ever grown tired of it and never likely to. The verses are memorable and the chorus makes you want to play the song over and over. Which I do, probably to the annoyance of everyone around me but I’m not particularly arsed about that. Listen to it once and I defy anyone who won’t sing along with this song, or have at least the chorus stuck in their heads for weeks, maybe even years after. I still am twenty years after I first heard it.

The version to listen to is the original version. Don’t bother with the remixes, although the instrumental version is good to just hear the music. Original is best, so here it is ladies and gentlemen (why I’ve pluralized there I don’t know, that should read “so here it is my one regular reader”), the video for Getting Away With It. Enjoy…

>And so it is back to me waffling on about my favourite tunes, once again. This time I’m looking at a song from the lighter end of my record collection. It is a pop song, and this particular song is as good as a pop song gets. No ifs, no buts. It has all the right ingredients.

It’s called Gypsy. It’s by Fleetwood Mac. I’ve always had a soft spot for Fleetwood Mac, regardless of the lineup, though it has to be said the band in my eyes was at its best when it had Lindsey Buckingham and Stevie Nicks at the forefront of the group. Peter Green’s lineup is blues orientated and there is so much good stuff there. But for me it’s the aforementioned “Rumours” line up that is my Fleetwood Mac of choice, and certainly the most commercially successful.

The song I’ve chosen here is an overlooked single (it reached no. 46 in the UK charts) taken from the 1982 album Mirage. Mirage, which is probably their weakest effort, came after the more experimental album Tusk, which alas didn’t sell in the same quantities as Rumours so was instantly branded a flop (I’d love a flop that sold in excess of five million copies, thankyou very much). So Mirage saw the band revert back to a more rock / pop sound.

Gypsy was written by Stevie Nicks back in 1979 during the height of her fame and was initially going to be included on her debut solo album Bella Donna. However, it was held back for Fleetwood Mac. To understand the song itself, if you are so inclined, we need to understand the inspiration behind it. Put simply, it took Stevie back to a time before the height of success and fame. In fact, back to a time when Stevie and Lindsey Buckingham were still a couple with no money, just an apartment with a king size mattress on the floor. According to Stevie in an interview in 2009:

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The next installment comes from one of my other favourite bands, New Order. New Order were formed from the ashes of Joy Division. After the suicide of Ian Curtis, the surviving members of Bernard Sumner, Peter Hook and Stephen Morris decided they would carry on. Without a front man they took it in turns to see who could sing. As it turns out none of them could, but Bernard drew the short straw.

My choice this week is my all-time favourite single – True Faith. This song saw them work with OMD and Pet Shop Boys producer Stephen Hague for the first time and was recorded in a ten day session along with equally good b-side “1963”. Upon its release it was available as two separate 12″ singles, a 7″ single and CD single and contained a plethora of remixes. Some good, some bad but none really improved on the original version of the song. Typical of New Order releases, the band name, song title and picture of the band were absent from the artwork. The title of the song, like many other New Order releases, was absent from the lyrics.

The song is pretty straightforward, with a great drum rhythm courtesy of Stephen Morris experimenting with machines and live drums together, a synthesized bass line and, thanks to Hooky playing the bass as if it were a lead guitar, some fantastic live bass runs.

Which version is best? There’s only one to go for – the original six minute version is by far the best version. It was remixed in 1994 for the best of compilation entitled “? – The Best of New Order”, but looses some of the sound of the original version. The radio edit versions aren’t worth bothering with and to be honest nor are the remixes. Until 1998, the live rendition of the song would be pretty faithful to the original. However, post 1998 an arrangement based on a remix was used as the template for the live performance to varying degrees of success. New Order were patchy live band, some nights would be bloody awful and some they were on fire. One thing you could be sure of though, Hooky would always put on a good show with the bass.

To promote the release of the single, a surreal video was produced. Starting off with strangely dressed dancers slapping each other on the face to the rhythm of the song, the dancing gets more and more weird. Add in a woman swaying in an upside down boxer’s bag whilst signing the lyrics to the song.

Why do I like it so much? I can’t really put a finger on it, it’s just one of those songs that sounds good every time you play it, no matter what you play it on. It’s great to play along to on the bass guitar. I love the video, it’s just brilliant. It also reminds me of past good times with mates.

Watch the promo video: