1975 Queen: Bohemian Rhapsody

‘Ahh!, 'Bohemian Rhapsody' or ‘Ahhrggh, 'Bohemian Rhapsody’!!!? Now that’s a moot question. 'Bohemian Rhapsody' is one of 'those' songs, an entity carved on the Mount Rushmore of rock that seems to have been around forever and which generates equal measures of gushing praise or venomous bile (see also ‘Imagine’, ‘Stairway To Heaven’ etc etc). The mock romantic classicism of its very title suggests we’re getting something out of the ordinary here, something with added gravitas that yanks it out of the dum dum arena of all this 'rock nonsense' and sets it on a plinth all by itself. It's a title of intent that couldn't have been clearer if it was called ‘SHUT UP AND LISTEN TO THIS, IT’S IMPORTANT’.

And what do you know, it appears to have worked - despite over 35 years of exposure, 'Bohemian Rhapsody' stands freakishly alone in the rock canon, a song that’s uniquely of itself and occupier of its own space. You won't hear it busked on the underground, belted out at karaoke or danced to in a nightclub. It's 'Bohemian Rhapsody' and it's by Queen and that's all there is to it. But I'm getting ahead of myself now.

Bo-he-mi-an:
noun (usually lowercase) a person, as an artist or writer, who lives and acts free of regard for conventional rules and practices.

Rhap-so-dy:
noun 1.Music. an instrumental composition irregular in form and
suggestive of improvisation.

So run the dictionary definitions, and this seem a fair description of what Mercury's magnum opus offers up. For at base, 'Bohemian Rhapsody' is a triptych of differing musical styles clamped together in a manner that tips its hat to side two of 'Abbey Road' but with (it has to be said) less skill. McCartney's work in stitching together the various works in progress on the latter was seamless, but 'Bohemian Rhapsody' allows some daylight between the joins. Or at least some of them; any number of bands could have 'done' the opening and the end sections (and many have slogged out whole careers doing just that), but it took a different kind of confidence and audacity to pull the middle operatic section out of the bag and make it all work.

Ahh/Ahhrggh, the middle operatic section - as part of 'Bohemian Rhapsody' it serves as both a bridge and a buffer between the opening ballad and the closing proto metal finale, two sections that would otherwise struggle to occupy space in the same song. In years gone by, all that ‘Scaramouch’ and fandangoing is what I used to like least about the song, but in hindsight it's the varnish that has in fact preserved it over the years. Because for a rock standard that everybody knows, 'Bohemian Rhapsody' has generated surprisingly few cover versions. I'll run through my pet theory as to why this should be later, but for now I'll mention the version that 'We've Got A Fuzzbox And We’re Going To Use It' recorded for a John Peel session in 1986 which elicited a rather hostile reaction from Queen fans at the time.

Why? Well even if you haven't heard it then you already have (it's available on the BBC Sessions 'Love Is A Slug' CD if you're interested) - just imagine four hyperactive, semi-sober schoolgirls singing a one take acappella version on the hoof and you're there. The lasses cope as well as can be expected up until the 'Gallileo's' kick in, at which point it collapses into a mess of self conscious giggling. And why shouldn't it? What other reaction could there be other than the embarrassment of realising you've bitten off more than you can chew, even when you're taking the piss?

And that’s my point - any attempt at covering this would end up too strait laced and knowing, too respectful to the source to do anything other than emulate. And in that even, how can you emulate when you don't know whether the original is meant to be taken straight or is camp excess personified? ‘Bad News’ had a dismal crack at the latter while Elaine Paige presented a rather humourless offering on her rather humourless ‘Queen Album’.

That neither got within a country mile of capturing the essence or scale of the song is because it took the straight faced yet tongue in cheek bravado of Freddy Mercury to front all this and make it listenable/believable. Those who try to 'make like he' are doomed to failure so they don’t even try. The song is bigger than all of them, hence the lack of ‘proper’ cover versions and the curious 'preserved in aspic' aura the song has. Because without it, what remains is rather ordinary all told.

The piano led opening has a surprisingly vulnerable Mercury hanging his insecurities out for the world to see ("I don't want to die, I sometimes wish I'd never been born at all" - he doesn't even hide his desperation behind a bouncing pop tune a la John Lennon with 'Help') while at the closing rock out the whole tone adopts a volte face until he's screaming defiance ("You think you can love me and leave me to die? Oh baby, can't do this to me baby").

Interpretations as to Mercury's meaning abound and I'll not go into them here, but suffice it to say that these are two very different, albeit ordinarily generic styles of music that by themselves sit together as well as squabbling flatmates that can't bear to be in the same room as each other. And though it’s inserted with the subtlety of a shoehorn stuffing a size 9 foot into a size 8 shoe, it’s the operetta that’s the peacemaker between them. By managing to knock expectations sideways with such a force, the twains are never allowed to meet and your rational brain comes to accept that anything is possible from here on in.

'Bohemian Rhapsody’ remains a curious proposition that has not been withered by age or repetition. For my own part, loved and loathed – I’ve done both to excess over the years. Now, in my dotage, the spirit level bubble of my take on it has calmly settled somewhere in the middle. I've made my peace with the song and, while it's not something I'll actively play, it's something I can enjoy without feeling guilty whenever I hear it. Yes it’s over the top and gaudy, but there’s also a thread of heartfelt emotion running through it that just about keeps it tethered to reason and stops it flying off up it’s own arse. Bottom line - it's 'Bohemian Rhapsody' and it's by Queen and that's all there is to it.

1975 Billy Connolly: D-I-V-O-R-C-E

A bit of background information is needed here I think - in June of this year, Tammy Wynette had a number 12 hit with 'D-I-V-O-R-C-E'. A typically overwrought country ballad, Wynette and hubby are going their separate ways but they spell out words like 'd-i-v-o-r-c-e' and 'c-u-s-t-o-d-y' when discussing their woes around their four year old son so that he doesn't get wind of what's going on. In other words, a song ripe for spoofing.

In Connolly's take, the little lad is replaced by his "wee scabby dog" and he spells out words like 's-h-o-t', 'w-o-r-m' and 'v-e-t' when he's around so that he doesn't get wind of what's going on either. That's not the whole joke but it's close, and what's left isn't enough to raise this particularly high in the comedy song stakes. Billy Connolly may be a legendary comedian (and as a former member The Humblebums with Gerry Rafferty he knows his way around a song), but just like watching someone walk into a lamp post can raise a schadenfreude of a smile the first time, 'D-I-V-O-R-C-E' is not something that gets any funnier with repetition, particularly as the song tails away as the joke wears thin. If you know the Wynette track then it's amusing enough, but those that don't will be left scratching their heads.

1975 David Bowie: Space Oddity

Though one of its biggest stars who's work came to define the Seventies, it's sobering to realise that Bowie's only number one of the decade came via a re-issue of a single originally released in 1969. In a way, it's quite a neat reclamation of the track; when it reached number 5 first time around, man was on the verge of stepping on the moon for and so it could easily have been seen every much of a gimmick song as the earlier 'The Laughing Gnome' - that is, an artist searching for an audience wherever he could find it. On reflection, the fact that something so 'now' didn't reach the top in 1969 could partly be due to a sense of contemporary 'bad taste' that pervades Bowie's tale of a space launch going horribly wrong.

If that in fact is what 'Space Oddity' is all about; with a further nod to it's title stealing source (Stanley Kubrik's '2001: A Space Odyssey'), dual meanings abound. Because unique for a number one single, Bowie released a 'follow up' in 'Ashes To Ashes' that also made the top of the charts and which suggests that Major Tom may have been a space cadet in more than one way with his problems having a more chemical than mechanical source. It's an interpretation that would make 'Space Oddity' an Ur 'Comfortably Numb'*, but regardless of what you do or don't read into it, it's quite endearing as to how up to date yet out of time 'Space Oddity' sounds in the 1975 charts.

And that's not 'out of time' in the sense of 'dated', but in terms of how it still manages to sound like nothing else around it, the same way it did in 1969. In 1975 it was far removed from Bowie's then left turn into 'white soul' and it made this re-issue something of a comfort blanket for the long term fans of the Starman aghast at his new direction (check out that cover shot for this re-issue). Indeed, one of the first things that strikes home about 'Space Oddity' is just how much Bowie manages to cram in to it's five minutes.

From the acoustic opening strum of the countdown to blast off and ultimate descent into oblivion, Bowie traces the Major's journey in both music and lyrics with tricks and motifs that never suffer the labour of wacky psychedelic gimmickry. Like the best examples of the genre, the spacey effects serve a purpose and aren't some cheap smeared on phasing designed to disguise shortcomings in the song or the playing. Even the much hyped (in 1969) use of the Stylophone is kept reined in and whatever you ultimately decide is going on here, there's something disturbingly final yet coolly understated in the deliberate pauses of:

"Ground control, to Major Tom
Your circuit's dead, there's something wrong"

It's an icy and removed description of a life spinning out of control and it's where Bowie leaves the good Major, content in his splendid isolation. Not that the open ended ending renders the song unsatisfying. It doesn't. The whole space age adventure of the song is enjoyable in its own right while the (slightly pretentious) man in me likes to ponder the existential statement (ahem) of human helplessness in "Planet Earth is blue and there's nothing I can do" line. My point being that there's depth there if you want it but 'Space Oddity' doesn't penalise you if you choose not to see it, a facet that makes 'Space Oddity' an endearing song with something for everyone.

* And to that end, compare Roger Waters:

"Hello?
Is there anybody in there?
Just nod if you can hear me.
Is there anyone home"?

With Bowie's repeated refrain "Can you hear me Major Tom"? or "I have become comfortably numb". with that "'Planet Earth is blue and there's nothing I can do". See what I mean? Oh please yourselves.

1975 Art Garfunkel: I Only Have Eyes For You

A much covered song, 'I Only Have Eyes For You' has been knocking about since 1934, but it's the 1959 version by The Flamingos that's become the definitive version that everybody knows. In their hands the song skews on an off-kilter arrangement with a spooky, moonlit ambience that elevates what is basically a Tin Pan Alley 'moon in June' love song into something more memorable. Garfunkel's take though is a straight pop arrangement that follows the melody faithfully and springs no surprises.

That Garfunkel can sing there can be no argument and I don't doubt the sincerity of his performance on this either, but the backing it's hitched to is a predicable and cloying syrup of strings that borders on muzak. Couple this with Art's vocal and it's akin to decorating a chocolate cake with even more chocolate. Fine if you like chocolate I guess (and let's face it, plenty do - hence the number one status of this), but for my money his perpetual choirboy pitch is always more agreeable when it's put up against something more jagged and substantial. Reason enough as to why, when he was in partnership with Paul Simon for example, I can listen to 'The Sounds Of Silence' or 'The Boxer' forever and a day, while their more overly twee output only serves to irritate.

Art Garfunkel's 'I Only Have Eyes For You' is a nice version of a nice song, nothing more and nothing less. That may sound overly pithy, but the only real emotion that the song generates for me is casual indifference. Which, I think, could be my review in a nutshell.

1975 David Essex: Hold Me Close

From the aloof cool of 'Rock On', for 'Hold Me Close' Dave transforms himself into your pissed mate at closing time in the pub, annoyingly throwing his arms around your shoulders and telling you you're his best friend in all the world. No really, you are. 'Hold Me Close' has a sprightly enough tune with a lyric that's pure music hall optimism, but while Essex tries to inject a Small Faces 'Lazy Sunday' type vibe into the song, his sloppy grin apples and pears vocal shoots it all in the head with every single syllable. Not his finest hour.

1975 Rod Stewart: Sailing

I don't know about 'Sailing', by 1975 Rod had already sailed away from these shores and in case anyone had any doubts, the title of the parent album 'Atlantic Crossing' made no bones about where he saw his future. I guess in fairness Stewart never denied his love for playing American R&B, and now he was famous enough to leave The Faces behind to go and play it with some genuine American R&B musicians down in Muscle Shoals. Fair enough.

Not that ''Sailing' has any pedigree in that direction mind; written by Scottish folkie Gavin Sutherland and recorded by The Sutherland Brothers in 1972, just like 'Without You' before it, 'Sailing' was not destined to be a success for its writer. But then again, seeing as the original sounds like a sea shanty played on a waterlogged Moog then maybe that's no surprise. Stewart's wisely noted and stressed its yearning quality in his interpretation and he recast it as a ballad by slowing it right down.

On a personal level, hearing 'Sailing' always invokes some strong and fond memories. It stayed at number one for four weeks, but for me in 1975 it seemed to hang around there a lot longer than that. The promo video of Rod slouching around some docks before meeting up with Britt Ekland seemed a permanent fixture on Top Of The Pops and yet the very factors that made it all seem so impossibly glamorous to me then are the very things that detract from the experience now.

Because at heart, 'Sailing' is the sound of Stewart wanting to have his cake and eat it. The cover picture of 'Atlantic Crossing' had a glammed up cartoon Rod striding into New York as a giant, pausing only to glance back and pour a few drops of ale on the Blighty he'd left behind. Yet as part of that backward glance, 'Sailing' is offered as an earthy home thought from abroad to show he was missing us already. As far as that goes the forced earnestness of his vocal ticks all the right boxes, but at heart it doesn't ring true.

To my ears, Rod's croak adopts the same pleading tone I'd use in 1975 whenever I tried to persuade my mother I was too sick to go to school when all I wanted to do was stay home and play with my trains. 'Sailing' makes all the right moves in its staircase climb from sparse opening to closing crescendo but it's a frosty affair that doesn't convince me that it's anything more than painting by numbers rather than genuine expressionism anymore than my playacting used to fool my mother. 'Sailing' is the sound of uncertainty, of Stewart trying to stay true to his roots by giving a theatrical wink to show the folks back home that he hadn't forgotten us whilst also putting down fresh ones that snaked off in the opposite direction. Rod may have crossed the Atlantic, but 'Sailing' suggests he was treading water all the way.

1975 The Stylistics: I Can't Give You Anything (But My Love)

It's the old story - skint bloke tries to woo woman with love alone ("But I'm an ordinary guy, and my pockets are empty"). I don't know how successful this gambit was, but I'd say any heart not melted by Russell Thompkins' sweet, sweet falsetto isn't worth the wear of winning in the first place. Though it was their first UK number one, 'I Can't Give You Anything (But My Love)' marked a crossroads for The Stylistics. After garnering critical and commercial success with writer and producer Thom Bell ('Betcha By Golly Wow', 'You'll Never Get to Heaven (If You Break My Heart)', 'You Make Me Feel Brand New' et al), a split in 1974 led to a flux of collaborators and mixed fortunes for the band both at home in the US home and in the UK.

Working this time with Van McCoy, 'I Can't Give You Anything' takes a slight detour from their Philly soul of yore into a breezier disco/pop arena. McCoy borrows the dancing swing from his own 'The Hustle' for the chassis of the song and scores the verses in a breath baiting minor key before the orgasmic eruption of the chorus. If anything, the production is a bit too smooth and a bit too slick for the anguish of a poor boy (compared to Bell's leaner, more gritty sound), but that's a small criticism - 'I Can't Give You Anything' is a lush, sumptuous experience that thankfully proves that, despite some eyebrow raising chart toppers in 1975, the great British public hadn't completely abandoned all notions of taste.

1975 Typically Tropical: Barbados

One of the changing social mores that enjoyed tremendous popularity in the Seventies were the emergence of cheap flights and package holidays to the continent, courtesy mainly of Mr Freddy Laker. Two weeks in the sun became affordable to all and with them came the emergence of a certain type of 'souvenir' pop song that celebrated this very fact, like Sylvia's 1974 hit 'Y Viva Espana'. 'Barbados' is frequently lumped in as part and parcel of this niche genre but I'm not so sure; Barbados as a holiday destination has never been the Costa Cheap and this is very much its own song in any case.

Told from the point of view of a (presumably black) Brixton bus driver, 'Barbados' is all about his desire to fly to Barbados on Coconut Airways to see some sun and his girlfriend. Simple enough eh? Well, not quite. If 'Barbados' had actually been penned and recorded by a black bus driver from Brixton then it would have a certain feelgood charm, but with the revelation that 'Typically Tropical' are basically Geraint Wyn Hughes and Jeffrey Calvert*, two white British session musicians, then their affected West Indian patois on the vocals (which only really extends as far as replacing 'de' for 'the' and 'me' for 'my') and the whole 'Coconut Airways' shtick starts taking on a less charming hue.

In many respects, 'Barbados' is the flip of 10cc's later 'Dreadlock Holiday', albeit minus the implied violence but with still enough racial stereotyping to cause no small offence. And not just that, the girl he's dying to see just so happens to be called 'Mary Jane', adding the implication (either by accident or design), that the 'flying' he intends to do to escape the rain of 'Brixton town in the night' is more via Class B than any recognised carrier. Because of course, all black bus drivers spend their evenings getting stoned on ganja, don't they?

'Barbados' is a jolly enough romp to be sure with a sunshine upbeat that sounded just dandy during the hot UK summer of 1975. To modern ears though, it's condescending (I won't be so uncharitable as to call it racist) and embarrassing and the ferociously catchy tune is probably now best sampled as The Vengaboys 1999 number one reworking 'We're Going To Ibiza' (although that's not without problems of its own). 'Barbados' itself is best placed alongside witch ducking, bear baiting and 'Love Thy Neighbour' in the cupboard marked 'well it seemed like a good idea at the time'.

* Hughes and Calvert would go on to play more than a bit part in my further musical education by penning 'I Lost My Heart To A Starship Trooper' for Sarah Brightman, notable for being the first single I ever bought with my own money. In my defence, I also bought 'Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick' at the same time, a fact I'm always keen to trumpet whenever I'm asked. As for the Brightman single, well it seemed like a good idea at the time.

1975 Bay City Rollers: Give A Little Love

In which the Bay City Rollers hijack the template The Osmonds laid down with 'Love Me For Reason' and produce a three minute bubblegum chorus with no other purpose than to get the early teen girls all gooey eyed. With Les McKeown assuring them "It's a teenage dream to be seventeen, and to find you're all wrapped up in love" it can't go wrong with its intended audience and, belt and braces, the chorus overdoses on fey repetitions of love, love, love to hammer the point home with a cynicism that borders on contempt. Ah, 'but it's only pop' I hear you cry. True, but at least The Osmonds had a patina of soul to give their pop some fizz; the pop of 'Give A Little Love' comes bottled without a stopper, and though there are some fairly lively bass runs, the end product is all rather flat and vacuous really and sounds is as dated as their tartan britches.

1975 Johnny Nash: Tears On My Pillow

Throughout the Seventies, reggae purists would regularly deride Bob Marley for diluting the genre through importing commercial Western musical influences into the mix and daring to make it popular. Purists will always be purists, but I guess the reaction of those same people would have been akin to thrombosis on hearing this for the first time.

Though an African American rather than from Caribbean descent, Nash had of course already scored UK hits with 'I Can See Clearly Now' and 'There Are More Questions Than Answers' which may have been more root beer than roots reggae but still possessed its unmistakable stamp. 'Tears On My Pillow' is more of this same pop/reggae hybrid, though this time there's more of the latter than the former and the whole presents a mellow car crash of styles looking for a direction.

Kicking off as a straight MOR ballad, 'Tears On My Pillow' soon falls into gentle reggae shuffle that this time sounds more an awkward a marriage of convenience than a true attempt to fuse genres. There's a stilted awkwardness about the track that kills any reggae groove stone dead and even the suspiciously Western sounding female backing singers fight against the current rather than go with the flow. The effect of these two directions is one of turgidity and, apart from a half hearted spoken word section, Nash himself sounds like he's singing a much happier song than the lyrics suggest. More than this, his abrupt snapping at the 'pillow' and 'heart' on the chorus are more suggestive of frustration and impatience than heartbreak.

There's a decent song buried somewhere in 'Tears On My Pillow' and its one that would have revealed itself far more readily had all involved followed just one thread instead of pulling at three or four simultaneously. As it stands, it's difficult to get anything out of the song other than a harmless three minute diversion - pleasant enough, but it's not something you want to keep returning to.

1975 10cc: I'm Not In Love

Probably their most famous song, 10cc's 'I'm Not In Love' is a faux anti-love love song that presents denial as a barometer of genuine emotional feeling; in other words, another clever dick song from a clever dick band. But this time, the duality of the lyric hides a deeper, chillier secret that provides 'I'm Not In Love' with a more disturbing and rewarding depth beyond the point where you think you've 'got it'.

But before we go there, a word on the music; if there's one thing that 10cc knew, it was their way around a studio and 'I'm Not In Love' washes along on a lush wave of massed choral overdubs. Too forceful for ambience but lacking any discernible melody, the sleeping gas of the music sounds as dreamily wondrous and as unlikely a backing for a number one today as it did in 1975.

The tune proper is carried by Eric Stewart's vocal that breaks free of the pack to deliver its subverted lyric of love/anti love: "I'm not in love, so don't forget it. It's just a silly phase I'm going through". In many ways it's the flip side of REM's later 'The One I Love' where Stipe compares a relationship he's in to 'a simple crutch to occupy my time', but on 'I'm Not In Love' Stewart isn't even prepared to admit that level of need. Cold enough by itself, but then it goes on......

"I keep your picture upon the wall. It hides a nasty stain just lying there". "

Nasty stain" is a bit of a howler in this world of earthrealy beauty and it's clunkiness spoiled the song for me in my youth. Ah, but experience came along and taught me that it's there for a purpose, that it's meant to be clunky. Because while this is something you may well say to your partner in teasing, when sang in the earnestly self conscious style of 'I'm Not In Love', all playfulness gets sucked out of the room until what remains is as unpleasant and nasty as the stain itself.

And that, along with the recurring "Oh you'll wait a long time for me" is, I think, the key to 'I'm Not In Love'. Stewart is not simply trying to convince his would be lover that there is no spark between them, he's also acknowledging his own inability to let anyone in, making the song not so much 'I'm Not In Love' as 'I'm Incapable Of Loving Anyone Ever'. The killer comes with the realisation that the inability to share emotion doesn't negate the ability to feel it, and the motherly whisper of 'Be quiet, big boys don't cry' on the middle eight suddenly makes the massed backing sound as cold as a winter fog.

I know people who have fallen in love to 'I'm Not In Love' and slowdanced to at their weddings, but there's no shame in being hoodwinked by master magicians who managed to produce six minutes of crippled emotion and pass it off as the real thing. And in the middle of summer too. Now how clever dick is that?

1975 Windsor Davies & Don Estelle: Whispering Grass

An odd one this - Estelle and Davies were both stars of the then popular BBC sitcom 'It Ain't Half Hot Mum', but while it's their names that are all over the sleeve, the voices in the grooves stay in the respective characters from the show of Gunner 'Lofty' Harold Sugden and Sergeant Major Williams. Estelle is a perfectly fine tenor and he croons the 1940's chestnut straight as a die, but then Davies interjects halfway with a Telly Savalas-like spoken rendition of the lyrics (they recorded a whole album of 1940's songs in this manner should you be interested).

Why this was felt necessary is unclear - it probably felt like a good idea at the time but it's neither funny nor adds anything to the song. Also, if his character was there as a selling point to emphasise the crossover from the show then it by itself is a major misfire - the last thing Sergeant Major Williams would do would be to encourage Lofty to sing, but I guess as long as he's there it's either that or hang around like a spare part (or mug furiously in the background while Estelle sang whenever they were called on to perform the song on television). 'Whispering Grass' is a classic of it's era and this version is by no means hateful, but it would have gone down a whole lot better if Davies had followed his own character's favourite order and SHUT UP!

1975 Tammy Wynette: Stand By Your Man

Just as the Great Grey Shrike is but an infrequent visitor to the UK, country music is an infrequent visitor to its top ten. The genre has never really taken hold on these shores and I think that's partly due to the reason that, just like the savage feeding habits of that 'butcher bird', country music tends to be savagely straightforward in it's internal morality; the lovin' and the hurtin' is cast in black or white and shot through with a God fearin' religion that us British pop music fans tend not to have an appetite for. Country rarely does the ambiguity or irony that we love and 'Stand By Your Man' is no exception to this.

Originally recorded in 1968, 'Stand By Your Man' is to country what 'Stairway To Heaven' is to rock - that is, a copper bottomed standard that even non genre fans will recognise from the off, though it's a song that tends to split opinion down the middle. For every heart warmed by the 'my man, right or wrong' message, there is one chilled by the unquestioning subservience of the female role that the song promotes. Feminists have had daggers drawn for Wynette because of it from day one, but for my own part I don't have too much of a beef either way. I'm happy to take it on it's own merits; if Wynette is happy enough to stand by her man whenever he's been horsing around then I'm happy enough not to criticise. She did co-write the song after all so it's not like she's been fed the lines puppet-like.

'Stand By Your Man' is typical nodding country fodder of plodding upright bass drenched with a steel guitar wash though its rescued from its own stereotype by the sincerity of Wynette's vocal. It cracks and wobbles along from the opening "Sometimes its hard to be a woman", but while it never sounds false or pantomime, neither does it manage to move me in anyway. By trying so hard to rev the emotional engine Wynette only succeeds in flooding it, and for all its iconoclasm my base response to 'Stand By Your Man' is a shoulder shrugging 'so what'?

I've always thought this tale of female devotion would have sat well as an ironic B side with Gloria Gaynor's 'I Will Survive' though I don't think many country fans would have appreciated it. Because maybe I'm being unfair, but by 'country fans' I can't help but picture the bearded rednecks crying into their beer while Jake and Elwood perform the song in 'The Blues Brothers', imbuing the lyrics with a level of seriousness that allowed no room for irony or the suggestion that none of the words came from the heart. On the other hand, I suspect Gaynor's fans would have found it a hoot. In such small observations the battle lines of my own taste in music are demarcated.

1975 Mud: Oh Boy

As they were now a bona fide Fifties revivalist band, it seems fitting that Mud should revive a bona fide Fifties classic. 'Oh Boy', of course, was originally a 1957 hit for Buddy Holly and The Crickets, a seminal rock and roll recording that provides one of the cornerstones upon which popular music came to rest. Holly's vocal has long since been a favourite of mine, a young man's can't wait headrush that veers between innocent wonder at this thing called love to a lust crazed sneer on the second round of "All of my life I’ve been a-waitin’, tonight there’ll be no hesitatin’" where he sounds like he's just dying to shag her brains out. Oh boy indeed.

By saddling it with a clumping half speed backbeat, Mud remove all of the teenage urgency and reduce the song to words and tune alone until it becomes a karaoke dirge that dispenses with the third dimension of excited anticipation that Holly provided. The song is strong enough not be completely derailed by this treatment, but the hormonal gloss becomes a middle aged matt finish that dulls and bores where it should shine. Telling then that Holly's 'Oh Boy!' came with an exclamation mark while Mud's comes with a full stop. Oh Boy? Oh Dear more like.

1975 Bay City Rollers: Bye Bye Baby

'Bye Bye Baby' was originally written and recorded by The Four Seasons in 1965. The Roller's version is a faithful cover in essence, but in substance it's like comparing the first little pig's house of straw with the last little pig's house made of bricks. The key is in the execution; Frankie Valli knew he had no small amount of campy bubblegum on his hands yet the tang of his New Jersey doo wop vocal gave the track a shot of street cred that raised the bar of interest for it's whole running time. Les McKeown, on the other hand, treats it as something far more serious from the off (just listen to his spoken intro "If you hate me after what I say, can't put it off anymore. I just gotta tell you anyway" compared to Valli's more tongue in cheek presentation) and in so doing he strips the song of all it's meaning/lack of meaning by sucking out all the hammy joy and replacing it with....well nothing really; the Bay City Rollers are blandness personified and in their hands 'Bye Bye Baby' is chug-a-lug, white bread pop that's as humourless and it's tasteless. I guess you just had to be there.

1975 Telly Savalas: If

Time for another trip down that lane called 'memory' - during 1974, I was hospitalised for a few unhappy days having my tonsils removed. One of my most vivid memories of the whole terrible experience is my first sight of colour television and watching Freddy Starr on it on 'Who Do You Do?' where he cracked a joke that went 'There were two flies on Kojak's head and one said "We're on Telly"'. It had the nurses in stitches but, being only six at the time, I didn't have much of a clue what he was on about and it wasn't until I saw Savalas singing this on Top Of The Pops a year later that I 'got' the joke (Telly/Television Ha Ha Ha).

Though perhaps 'singing' is stretching the definition a bit; like 'Everything I Own', 'If' is another David Gates/Bread original given a radical makeover; this time, instead of a reggaefied version, Savalas simply recites the lyrics as if they were prose of high drama (Windsor Davies would be taking notes). Gate's apocalyptic imagery ("If the world should stop revolving spinning slowly down to die, I'd spend the end with you") actually lends itself to this quite well to this interpretation, but instead of sounding heartfelt, Savalas' voice comes across as creepily sinister in the extreme, as if he himself is the engineer of the world's destruction and he's hovering waiting to cart any stray souls off to hell.*

Nothing could be further from Savalas intention though; he's totally sincere in his lovestruck delivery (check out the contemporary video where Tel lights up then mooches around giving the camera the sort of emotionally charged looks his voice can't convey) and this alone makes 'If' a very odd proposition for a chart topper to modern ears. But of course, it's there at the top largely because of the times; that's not Telly Savalas singing, it's Kojak, and this novelty element was the key factor, being as it was a further extension/exploitation of the popularity of the detective character along with the lollipops and catchphrases. Taken on it's own merits outside of its context, then to modern sensibilities 'If' is the cornball novelty sound of a popular actor overreaching himself (David Soul would also be taking notes).

Because here in the 2000's, the wheel has turned full circle; 'Kojak' is no longer the number one American import and if you told the flies joke to any X Factor wannabe then like as not you'll get a blank stare similar to the one I gave the nurses in 1974. But if Savalas pitched up and tried to audition in front of Simon and the gang with this then there'd be one of those shepherd's crook things emerging from the wings to pull the bugger off sharpish.

* Actually, the previous year Savalas had played the male half of the title in Mario Bava's 'Lisa e il diavolo' ('Lisa And The Devil') where his satanic presence and spooky laughs terrorised Elke Sommer for ninety minutes. On 'If', Savalas sounds like he's still in character. Maybe he should have sung this at the start and finished her off early doors.

1975 Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel: Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me)

Never one of nature's wallflowers, with Cockney Rebel, Steve Harley purveyed a musical hybrid that sought to fuse the outré experimental Glam electronica of a Roxy Music with the serious wordplay and surreal imagery of a Bob Dylan. Sometimes it worked '(Mr Raffles', 'The Psychomodo'), most times it didn't ('Sebastian', 'Mr Soft'...oh take your pick), though at all times it carried a whiff pretentiousness that allowed none of the former's playfulness or the latter's mystery. Ironic then that Harley's biggest hit should come via one of his most straightforward recordings.

As a matter of fact, 'Make Me Smile (Come Up and See Me)' was recorded by Cockney Rebel Mark Two as a kiss-off raspberry to the original line-up after all bar one quit through disillusionment at the figure Harley was cutting in the media; no small co-incidence then that this is credited to 'Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel'. Not that it's that all that obvious from the lyrics where the bile is directed; lines like "Blue eyes, blue eyes, how come you tell so many lies"? can easily be taken to refer to the end of any love affair and so allow the song a broader appeal.

And actually too, 'Make Me Smile' isn't that straightforward either. Though it's based on a chunkily acoustic, almost flamenco strum, the chief selling point are those full stops of silence at the end of every chorus, broken each time by Harley's sardonic drawl. Take them out and the song becomes a very ordinary and meandering chorus in search of a hook, but slotted in place they become the chorus and the hook that pulls you in. By stamping on the brakes, it forces you to listen by coolly focussing attention as surely as the slap in the face that Harley was dishing out to his ex bandmates. So effective are they that it comes as a disappointment that 'Make Me Smile' bottles the ending by fading to a close rather than coming to a grinding halt. The latter may have resulted in an unsatisfactory "is it time to clap now????"confusion that would have spoiled the effect, but the former suggests a man running out of ideas and pandering to convention. Judging by the rest of his output from here on in, maybe there was a lot of truth in that so enjoy it while it lasts.

1975 Pilot: January

"January. Sick and tired you've been hanging on me" - those who wouldn't know a member of Pilot if they fell over them would probably recognise the chorus to this. From somewhere. It's one of 'those' catchy affairs that, once heard, proceeds to stick in your mind like limpets on a rock whether you like it or not. Birthday's, anniversaries, the face that you lusted over in school that year - these things are transient, but you'll never forget how 'January' 'goes'. Though that's not necessarily anything good. Because for my own part I remember this from 1975 and my then irritation at that rather forced non rhyme - 'January'....'Hanging on me' - it doesn't really work, does it? It still irritates now, but my older ears detect more to be wound up by than just that.

For a start, 'January' never seems to know whether it wants to single handedly initiate a glam revival or whether it's just content to mop up the leftovers from the Bay City Roller's fanbase (writer/bassist David Paton was a former member of the BCR's). Guitarist Ian Bairnson lets rip with some fine, Mick Ronson-alike lead guitar riffing at the opening and throughout but whenever the vocals kick in, 'January' immediately reverts to the bland safety of well chewed bubblegum. And not a gentle revert either - the effect is like a handbrake turn and it really makes it sound like two separate songs chucked together, creating a skewed and not very enjoyable experience. I'm still none the wiser whether the 'January' of the lyrics refers to the month or a woman, but it doesn't matter much in the end; the whole is so uninvolving that neither interpretation would make the song any more or less memorable. Apart from that irritating chorus of course.

1975 The Tymes: Ms Grace

Opening with a slowburning, mulittracked celestial chorus of voices, 'Ms Grace' is presented as something gift wrapped with a bow, as if something incredibly special is about to go off. Unfortunately, once out of the wrapping the song lets itself down by falling into a spiral of predictability that never resolves into anything memorable. Apart from the repeated hook on the chorus, 'Ms Grace' lacks any kind of backbone to drape itself over, and with nothing supporting the repetition makes the whole thing fall over flat before it gets to the end.

It's a pleasant enough listen should it come on the radio, but there's precious little to make you want to actively seek it out. Not swinging enough for disco and not....well, soulful...enough for soul, 'Ms Grace' occupies an awkward no-mans land that fails to satisfy anybody totally (or as I've said before, it's a song to like rather than love). The Tymes had done better than this, but since they'd been a recording outfit since the fifties then maybe they deserved a number one prize for good attendance.

1975 Status Quo: Down Down

In light of the soap opera starring cabaret act they became, it's difficult to convey to those not around at the time that Status Quo were a serious concern throughout the seventies, a reliable brand name that most heavy rockers would proudly wear on their denim and leathers next to the Black Sabbath and Deep Purple badges. For heavy rockers they were; from some very British psychedelic roots, Status Quo locked into a trademark heads down, no bullshit twelve bar blues format early and they've only rarely strayed off the path from that day to this.

And in that, 'Down Down' is virtually interchangeable with any of their earlier genre singles; 'Paper Plane', 'Caroline', 'Mean Girl' - it's no better and no worse than any of them and all represent what Quo always did best at their best. That is, provide a ramrod straight backbone and angry bee drone of guitar noise that, what it lacks in subtlety, makes up for by bludgeoning repetition. With zero emotional involvement and no musical gimmicks there's literally nothing to be done with 'Down Down' other than shake your head in time with it. Whether those shakes are a fierce headbanging up and down or a dismissively slow side to side depends on your politics - 'Down Down' is workaday rock that's not going to convert anybody into a mean metal mutha, but it's approximately a squillion times removed and a squillion times better than 'Burning Bridges' or 'The Anniversary Waltz'. And thank Christ for that eh?