Tuesday 25 September 2012

Atavism

I've been back to the seventies. Musically, but when music comes the memories come with it. Something - I don't know what - put me in mind of Althia and Donna and their glorious hit Uptown Top Ranking. Here's a picture of my copy!

Gosh, I've just posted a picture of a record. Next thing, I shall be posting a poor-quality video of it playing on YouTube. No I won't. Someone else will have done it already.

Anyhoo (sic - American) it took me right back. Apparently it was released in 1977 and got to number 1 in the Hit Parade (oh how I miss that term) in February 1978. I thought it was earlier but the interweb tells me otherwise. Not to mention the date on the record. I like to think that I was ahead of the game and bought it in 1977 but I really don't know. What I do remember - vividly, sharply and with a stab to the heart - is the effect it had on me. I had no idea what they were singing about and I don't think I ever did (until yesterday when I Googled the lyrics) but that song bypassed my brain and went straight to the viscera. It was wild. It made me jump up and down. It filled me completely. I wasn't well-versed in reggae - possibly my only exposure at that stage would have been Desmond Dekker's The Israelites (or "My Eyes Are Alight" as the mondegreen has it. Do you know about mondegreens? Another time.) I was more of a Roxy Music/Pink Floyd/T Rex/Jethro Tull/Blondie sort of girl. Perhaps I somehow knew that two women (and they were young - 17 and 18) singing reggae was unusual. Perhaps it was that one of them wore big glasses (I would have seen them on Top of the Pops, but possibly not initially). Perhaps it was those horns. Perhaps I did understad the lyrics on some level. All I know is that it electrified me. And still does.

Here it is then - I chose the clip of them on TOTP so you can see them, but it doesn't beat putting your own copy on your own record player (yes, I still have one) and dancing round your front room in your nightie, like I've just done. And wining up your waist like billy-o.

Thanks for listening - see you soon...

15 comments:

  1. More about Mondegreens please!

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  2. Good morning m'lady - how lovely to see you in my humble blog. Have noted your request and will process it in due course.

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    1. Thank you for your prompt response. I look forward to hearing from you soon regarding this matter.

      Is it like when my friend Steven thought Abba were singing 'when the bus had to go' but they were really singing 'one of us had to go'? There is rich pickings in them their hills.

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    2. That is exactly what it is - rich pickings indeed.

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    3. I hesitate to write very much in case it STILL won't let me play (whoever or whatever IT is.) I shall simply say that I too adored and still adore Uptown Top Ranking. On the subject of fabulous reggae songs what about Night Nurse by Gregory Isaacs? And (at the risk of being terribly frustrated by writing all this and it then disappearing) in a sort of "song chain" that immediately made me think of Graham Parker and the Rumour's Hotel Chambermaid. Songs about women in uniform...

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    4. How very pleasing to see you! And yes, yes yes Night Nurse. I am not familiar with Hotel Chamberlain - ooh look what I've done - and will scamper over to YouTube to seek it out.

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  3. Completely new to me, completely incomprehensible but I LOVED the free neck of the one on the left. Or was she on the right? Depends which way one is looking at it. The one without butterfly's hair anyway (I am safe at the moment since butterfly is in Stratford)

    I was so happy to see a post from you today to take my mind off the horrors of Giant Book Sales and Dolls House Museums....

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  4. Yes, now you come to mention it - perhaps I'll use the video as a teaching aid! The juxtaposition of Giant Books Sales and Dolls House Museums is quite dizzying...

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  5. Tell me about it! And having posted information about the Giant Book Sale on the google group "Girls Own" (which I thought was a yahoo group but it doesn't seem to be - am massively confused) I am being inundated with requests for specific titles. All very encouraging but....

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  6. Quite. And are you constantly taking bites from different cakes?

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  7. Oh yes indeedy :-)(tho was puzzled as to how you could have known that)

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    1. Well if you have to be giant in one moment and tiny in another....

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  8. My all time favourites (apart from the bear called Gladly as a result of mondegreens) remain the peerless suggestions offered to Terry Wogan as the lyrics for The Three Degrees song (can't reveal title - you have to work it out if you don't already know)... Bicycle Pump, or also known as My Pimple Hurts...
    xx
    Oh, btw, you now have favicon for me too!

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  9. Hee hee - and am pleased that favicon has arrived xx

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