Category: Music

CD#472 – Speak & Spell – Depeche Mode

Speak and Spell wasn’t an album I had when it first came out.  In fact I only purchased a CD copy a few years ago.  As with most of my music history, I listened to the radio and followed singles.  As a result, tracks like New Life, Just Can’t Get Enough and Dreaming of Me are my bread and butter.  Depeche Mode or “depeche-ay” as they seem to have been called in their early days (according to TOTP) has always been one of my favourite bands.  I grew up with the synth sound in my early teens and the music still seems as fresh today as it did then.

The tracks on Speak & Spell are certainly an eclectic mix.  The intro to New Life was a call to the dance floor (not that I did that much dancing).  But that almost siren-sounding intro was an instant trigger to get up and move – and still is.  New life has lots of intricate changes, but remains a consistent theme all the way through.

Contrast that to Just Can’t Get Enough, a classic Vince Clark riff, which has everyone tapping the tune out every time they hear it.  The hook is enduring enough that 35+ years later, it still sounds great, despite the tinny and totally synthetic sound of the synthesiser on which is was written.  Although the track sounds simple, the overlays of each melody are incredibly well interwoven that they sound effortless, but clearly aren’t.

So much of this album seems like an experiment.  What can we try?  What works, what doesn’t? What musical variations can we create? I Sometimes Wish I was Dead, with that very odd twinkling sound.  This wouldn’t have been a successful single, but is a great album track (and only 2 minutes long).  Puppets reminds me a little of Computer Love by Kraftwerk, pioneers of the synthesiser sound.

I like this album more and more as I play it.  It shows that great tunes will last the test of time.

Favourite Track: Just Can’t Get Enough

  1. New Life – 3:47
  2. I Sometimes Wish I was Dead – 2:18
  3. Puppets – 3:57
  4. Boys Say Go! – 3:08
  5. Nodisco – 4:16
  6. What’s Your Name? – 2:46
  7. Photographic – 4;43
  8. Tora! Tora! Tora! – 4:39
  9. Big Muff – 4:25
  10. Any Second Now (Voices) – 2:35
  11. Just Can’t Get Enough – 3:45
  12. Dreaming of Me – 4:02

CD#370 – The Hurting – Tears for Fears

Which band can bring back memories of being a teenager better than Tears for Fears? Listening to songs for this album transports me instantly back to places and people.  As a teenager I was definitely a singles fan, so put Mad World, Pale Shelter or Change on and I’m there – word perfect. However, I’m less familiar with the remainder of the album, most of which I consider to be typical album tracks, with the exception perhaps of The Way You Are (which is on my extended version).

TFF are one of the bands that had a definite division to their early and late music.  Comparing The Hurting to The Seeds of Love, released only six years later and there’s even more focus on production quality and detail, that is initially evident on the first album.  Perhaps that’s why I liked them; I’m not a real fan of live music but prefer the consistency of hearing the tiny details in the master version of any music.

Change is definitely at the top for me as a favourite track, with what I guess is the glockenspiel chorus and the constant change of tempo and style throughout the song.  As the Wikipedia entry for the album helps to clarify, there are additional tracks from the release/remaster in 1999 (the copy I have).

Favourite Track: Change

  1. The Hurting
  2. Mad World
  3. Pale Shelter
  4. Ideas as Opiates
  5. Memories Fade
  6. Suffer the Children
  7. Watch me Bleed
  8. Change
  9. The Prisoner
  10. Start of the Breakdown
  11. Pale Shelter (Long Version)
  12. The Way You Are (Extended)
  13. Mad World (World Remix)
  14. Change (Extended Version)

CD#066 – Full Moon Fever – Tom Petty

It seems quite appropriate to start reviewing and listening to my CD collection in more detail with Tom Petty.  Sadly Tom’s death was announced last week at the age of 66.

Wikipedia tells me that the album went gold in the UK with over 100,000 sales.  I’m not sure what directed me to Tom Petty (and the Heartbreakers) in the first place, but it may have been his involvement with the Travelling Wilburys.  Whatever the reason, this is an album I’ve played so many times.  I think of it as a classic style, mulitple songs that are singles in their own right, with hidden album gems like Zombie Zoo.  The sound is so familiar, but of course that is bound to be due to the involvement of other Wilbury members like George Harrison and Jeff Lynne.  Songs like “A Face in The Crowd” have a real Harrison feel.  From memory this was a classic time for Harrison and Co (with Cloud Nine released two years earlier).  Tom Petty offered a new angle to the Wilbury sound with more of a rock style.

There’s more than one influence here though.  “I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better” has a real resonance the 1960’s and  “Needles and Pins” by The Searchers.

This album continues to be one of my favourites, with certain tracks hitting the top ten of the ones I play on iTunes.

Favourite Track: Zombie Zoo, a classic 3-minute pop song.

  1. Free Fallin’ – 4:17
  2. I Won’t Back Down – 2:58
  3. Love Is A Long Road – 4:08
  4. A Face In The Crowd – 3:59
  5. Runnin’ Down a Dream – 4:50
  6. I’ll Feel a Whole Lot Better – 2:50
  7. Yer So Bad – 3:05
  8. Depending On You – 2:49
  9. The Apartment Song – 2:33
  10. Alright For Now – 2:01
  11. A Mind with a Heart Of its Own – 3:31
  12. Zombie Zoo – 2:57

Wikipedia Page: Full Moon Fever

Music

I’ve always been interested in music.  For as long as I can remember, I’ve sung along to tunes (much to everyone’s disgust) and I must be one of the few people who is happy to get up and do Karaoke without a drink.  The earliest song I remember singing was Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep by Middle of the Road (which you can find here on YouTube), which must have been when I was about 4 or 5 years old.

At the turn of the millennium I was co-founder of a music-based startup called Razorcuts.  We sold custom CDs and did digital downloads way before Apple was selling iPods.  Unfortunately the business didn’t make it, because we couldn’t get access to decent content.  Perhaps a discussion for another day.

I’m also a reasonable collector of music, although not as obsessional as some people.  I tend to stick to well known stuff and the more mainstream, although I don’t have a particular genre that I like.  This tends to mean I have lots of CDs and playlists from which I choose stuff at various times, depending on mood.  My MIL doesn’t think I listen to the hundreds of CDs littered around the house, which is true as I have them all digitised and indexed then available through iTunes.  It’s probably one of the only things I’m OCD about, other than perhaps filing and organising photographs.  I keep promising to systematically go through my CDs and play them, although that tends to fall by the wayside as I prefer to work without music these days.  So in the spirit of going back and getting best use, I’m going to start a series of posts with a weekly (or bi-weekly if I can manage it), review of a CD I’ve been listening to.

Now, you may ask why don’t I use Spotify?  Well, I’ve collected CDs (and before albums) for a long time and I like the feel of physical media.  I also don’t like the idea of investing every month into something I will ultimately never own.  Yes, it’s outdated thinking, but it’s what I do.

Look out for posts in the coming weeks!