Darling Daughter informed me yesterday that her school will shortly be holding its annual air band competition. Apparently each year this event is assigned a theme and a list of eligible songs is furnished to all the wannabee axe heroes/heroines.
And the theme this year?
The eighties.
I just about withered and died of old age when I heard that.
After recovering from my sudden and rapid decrepitude, I discovered that my street cred with Darling Daughter was increasing as I recognized and provided
both artist and useless facts to flesh out the names of their potential performance pieces. The menu included such hoary old chestnuts as The Clash's "Should I Stay or Should I Go," Kenny Loggins' "Footloose," and Cyndi Lauper's "Girls Just Wanna Have Fun." The last of these ended up being chosen by
my progeny and her gang of Grade 3 grrlz, primarily because of the title. At least it wasn't "Footloose."
But it got me thinking: if I had my druthers, what other eighties tracks would I put on the airband list? As I pondered, I realized this could get tricky; after all, cool as it might be to stick "Debaser"on there, Daddy FiL winced slightly at the thought of 7-year-olds miming along to "Got me a razor / Aaah haaa haaa haaah / Slicing up eyeballs..." You see my point. Anyway, below are a few ditties that I thought might fit the bill. And I would be most interested to hear your suggestions...
Adam & The Ants - Antmusic (buy here)
Oh my, this is just fun, fun, FUN swimming in a pool of edgy, pop sensibility.
Siouxsie & The Banshees - Christine (buy here)
Coz it's never too early to get your kids into goth, especially when it involves banana split ladies and turtles.
The Brilliant Corners - Teenage (buy here)
The eighties weren't all big shoulder pads, Madge, and synthopop, you know. But I'm pretty sure Miss Teacher didn't have this sort of C86 thing in mind. It might also be a bit precocious and hormonal for the bairns, but it does have a fat, charmingly innocent streak running right down its middle. Aw, bless, it's lovely.
In other news, this week's Contrast Podcast is now out and it slaps you right in the face with a halibut-sized serving of the best choonz of 2008 (so far). Given the excellent taste of the CP Nation, you can be sure that what's on offer is indeed among The Best of the year. You can download the podcast here and fawn over the music here. In case you want to look before committing to download (I don't know, kids these days) here's what's what:
(00:00) Flight of the Conchords - All the ladies of the world
Tim from The face of today
(03:05) Royal Bangs - Cat swallow
Bob from Gimme Tinnitus
(07:45) These Modern Socks - Where I came from
Linda from Speed of dark
(14:14) Japandroids - No Allegiance to the Queen
FiL from Pogoagogo
(21:47) The Cure - The only one
Adam
(26:24) DeVotchKa - The clockwise witness
Marcy from Lost in your inbox
(31:14) The Weepies - Old coyote
Natalie from Mini-obs
(35:41) KaiserCartel - Okay
Duke of Straw from The Late Greats
(39:31) The Wedding Present - Spider-man on Hollywood
Jim from Quick Before it Melts
(42:48) Be Your Own Pet - Becky
Dirk from Sexy Loser
(46:45) Blind Melon - Wishing Well
Chip from Atomic Ned
(51:17) Counting Crows - Cowboys
James from Appetite For Distraction
(57:29) At the Stars - Forget
Andy from Circles of Concrete
(01:01:49) Stars - Take me to the riot
Miss Wired
(01:06:10) Religious Knives - The sun
ZB from So the wind won’t blow it all away
(01:12:27) Sun Kil Moon - Unlit hallway
Greer from A Sweet Unrest
Hinterland - Detwiler Pavilion (buy here )
A catchy ditty about, of all things, obsessive-compulsive disorder. From the album Pan Pan Medico.
Next week we're back to sinning, so think thoughts of Greed and get submitting by following the instructions here.
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