
Never Understand – Jesus and Mary Chain (1985, Creation Records, Taken from ‘Psychocandy’)
It dawned on me on the walk home from the village shop that I probably wouldn’t be able to write about the Jesus and Mary Chain or various other bands in the Parish Magazine either. The devilish side of me wanted to put ‘Reverence’ on the list just because of the chorus, but sense soon kicked in, because in reality, no one who is remotely serious about music would take ‘Reverence’ to a desert island, particularly if you have every other Jesus and Mary Chain track to choose from, which I did.
If I was actually on the proper Desert Island Discs, the Jesus and Mary Chain track that I would select would ‘Never Understand’ for two reasons. Firstly, obviously, because it’s a bloody chaotic mess of a song and every second of it is brilliant because of the chaotic mess that is swirling around it. The second reason is because when it gets dark and the wild beasties start circling around my little camp, having the ability to play this as loud as possible for a few minutes a day would probably scare off even the hardest of hungry flesh eating mammals.
Talking of scaring off terrifying carnivores, if I had to choose a bunch of songs that I would take to a desert island that I could play to stop me being eaten alive, then after ‘Never Understand’ had finished it would be swiftly followed by a quick blast of My Bloody Valentine– and by the way – that is a series just waiting to be written “Songs to stop you being eaten alive”.
You Made Me Realise – My Bloody Valentine (1988, Creation Records, taken from ‘You Made Me Realise EP’)
‘You Made Me Realise’ is colossal, a brain achingly noisy, reverb inspired, ear splittingly incredible song. The musical equivalent of being stood on the middle of Dartmoor as hailstones the size of golf balls fall all around you. Dangerously brilliant in other words.
On the way home I discounted about seventy songs from my final list of three, some I tossed aside like old crisp packets, like this one for instance, I mean it’s great and I love it to absolute bits but would I want it on a desert island as the darkness rolled in, probably not.
Territorial Pissings – Nirvana (1991, Geffen Records, Taken from ‘Nevermind’)
Others my conscious wrestled with me like Tarzan meeting a crocodile whilst swimming across a lake.
The Rat – The Walkmen (2004, Record Collection Records, Taken from ‘Bows + Arrows’)
Seriously several villagers lives would be enriched by them exploring that song and it shames me that it didn’t make the final list.
There were also one or two songs that I had to discount because the reasons for picking them are simply way too personal to share with retired colonels, shop keepers, gardeners and farmers. Songs that were I interesting and/or famous enough to be on the real Desert Island Discs I would be able to weave an emotional tale of what that record meant to be, whilst grannies around the country adjusted their embroidered pillows which have my face on them and remarked about what a lovely chap I am.
Songs like this
Summer Babe (Winter Version) – Pavement (1991, Big Cat Records, Taken from ‘Slanted and Enchanted’)
And definitely this
Shine A Light – Spiritualized (1991, Dedicated Records, Taken from ‘Laser Guided Melodies’)
Which left me by the time I got home, with three tracks and tomorrow I’ll share the final piece that I wrote for the Parish Magazine.