Rueful soft soul comforted by great pillowing banks of Philly-style orchestration, industrial quantities of it: never mind the quality, feel the gloss (and enjoy the louche brass while you’re at it). The production on “Sad Sweet Dreamer&#[…]

Versions of “Annie’s Song”, in order of preference:
1/ The “Greasy Chip Butty” song, which effortlessly out-poetries Denver in the content-meets-form sensory hit of its images and hence taps directly into the spirit of t[…]

Lightning-fast moves, uncanny tricks, kids picking up on a craze hip-first and sparking a frisson of establishment fear – no surprise that the song cashing in on the Kung Fu fad was a disco one. Of course Carl Douglas in his headband looks like[…]

One of many drunken nights ago in a University bar I got into a vicious competition over Boyzone’s version of this song. My table would put the Boyzone song on the jukebox. Another bunch of drinkers at the next table would reply with Weezer&#82[…]

The danger of using orchestration to suggest luxury is that it can turn a record inert, putting up a discreet rope between the audience and the opulence: the effect is like a crowd barrier in a stately home, protecting the rooms from gawkers but also[…]

The high tide of glam goes out and soul music fills the gap, but soul is changing. Disco is heavenly music – it rests on a belief in the eternal (the groove), and decrees that such an eternity must be filled with sweetness… and if you wer[…]

People remembering the 1970s as a grim decade must surely be forgetting records like this, which prove that it was also a time of romance and sophistication. Romance of course meaning “French”. And sophistication meaning….”French&[…]

Gary Glitter is a liability on his own record: “Always Yours” sparks to life each and every time the backing boys yell the title hook, and then the momentum gradually putters away as weak-lunged Garry oohs and aahs and cheeky-boys through[…]

“The Streak” isn’t awful as comedy records go, in fact musically it slips down very easily, a perky country number with a few good rhymes for “streak” as its highlight. But not only does Stevens succumb to the blight of […]

“Sugar Baby Love” has been ruined for me – actually, no, I don’t know if ruined is the right word – it’s been colonised by The Auteurs’ 1999 single “The Rubettes”, which hollows it out from the inside like some evil necrotising viru[…]