A fond farewell, then, to R.E.M., one of the most eminent bands of the last 30 years, whose work I always admired - but, to be honest, struggled to love. I’ve got most of their albums, but with a few exceptions, never really listened to them more than once or twice; it’s all a little bit too cerebral and civilised, and in need of a few more “volume up to 11″ moments (such as “What’s the Frequency, Kenneth”). TM puts it very well (via God’s great gift of irony) when describing their break-up:

“I knew it was too good to be true … all that ‘caring about the world’ and ‘eating tofu’ has finally got the better of them and they’ve broken down in a bilious display of acrimonious nastiness. Here’s some classic band break-up nastiness from Stipe: “I hope our fans realise this wasn’t an easy decision; but all things must end, and we wanted to do it right, to do it our way,” Stipe said as he announced the split. It’s like the Sex Pistols or Pixies all over again…”

R.E.M.’s “vegan break-up” was indeed emblematic of my struggles to really love them - and in order to completely contradict myself for no good reason, the tribute song I’ve chosen as TTOTDOWOHOHCBATCI is one of their most sensitive and tragic; even bordering on mawkish. It’s “The Wrong Child”, last track on side 1 of their breakthrough album “Green”, and it’s a fairly self-explanatory tale told from the point of view of a child struggling to gain acceptance from his peers. The lyrics are reasonably obvious (although they do a great job); the real genius is in the arrangement. The slightly off-key mandolin, the canon-style backing vocal and the stripped-down production make it a haunting, emotionally-piercing experience which is difficult to forget. (Some considerably more intelligent analysis of the song can be found here.)

(Apologies for temporary inability to upload song. I’m sure it’s all TM’s fault - the fact that I haven’t done any routine maintenance to the relevant software on my machine for MONTHS can have nothing whatsoever to do with it.)

Every dashing young desperado with even a passing interest in music dreams, at one stage or another, of forming a band with his / her mates - and many have ended up doing so, especially since the technology has become affordable to all, and since punk rendered obsolete the boring old necessity of having a modicum of musical ability. I suspect, however, that many down the years have fallen by the wayside at the difficult first stage - finding a band name.

There are endless naming paths open to fashionable young chaps in this year’s trousers; you can go wacky (”Manic Street Preachers”, “Ned’s Atomic Dustbin”, “Electric Light Orchestra”), you could go for “(X) and the (X)” - (e.g. Cliff Richard and the Shadows, or Simple Minds’ first incarnation “Johnny and the Self-Abusers”); or maybe try “Definite Article + Something” (The Fall, Cult, Move, Kinks etc), or even just a one-syllable effort, as was particularly vogueish during the ’90s (e.g. Blur, Jizz, Ride, Cast, Guff, Cud, Wang, Pulp, Belch or Flob.*)

Whether they’re looking for something punchy, zany, clever or witty, some bands do well, others far less so. For every “Rolling Stones” there’s a “Kajagoogoo”, and for every “Bill Haley and the Comets” there’s a “Fast Breeder and the Radio Actors” (an early tantric manifestation by Sting). But some names are simply appalling - here are my top 5 offenders. With all the words available in the English language, you’d think that 3/4+ intelligent people together would be able to come up with SOMETHING better than this crap:

5)  “The The“  - must have seemed very piquant to head honcho Matt Johnson at the time, but the novelty wears off after about 10 seconds. A clear case of “no, I write the songs, so I’m choosing a witty name and I’m blummin’ well sticking to it!” A shame, because the Johnson’s dystopian visions, driving melodies and scathing rants are otherwise largely brilliant. (Incidentally, a by-product of the band’s name is that it renders selling “The The” rarities on eBay extremely challenging. Cheers, Matt.)

4) “Dumpy’s Rusty Nuts“- Really? If you say so.

3) “Does It Offend You, Yeah?“ - Fuck off.

2)  “30 Odd Foot Of Grunts“- if this was Russell Crowe’s “vanity project”, then with a name like that, he must have a fairly low opinion of himself.

And finally 1) “It Bites“ - a particularly tragic case, because the band concerned (a great personal favourite of mine) should, fuelled by astonishing amounts of talent plus large wodges of Richard Branson’s dough, have heralded a new dawn for progressive rock in the mid ’80s. Sadly, they split after only 3 albums, stymied a) by being best known for a “novelty” song (”Calling All The Heroes”), and b) by having the WORST SODDING BAND NAME IN THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD, EVER. (Seriously - HOW did they get to the point of signing a record contract without someone - or rather many, many people - taking them to one side and saying “Lads - you were great tonight, but joking apart, “It Bites” is a shit name. Change it. Change it NOW.”)

PS - dishonourable mention also to “The Beatles”, which is a pretty poor effort - although in their case, the music was so good that it has detoxified the craptacularly cheesy pun.

(* - Some of these may or may not be figments of my fading, low-grade-indie-addled, powers of recall…)

It strikes me, a mere fortnight after my initial post, that some of you won’t have heard anything by either The Clash or Yes - a situation which is easily remediable through the under-employed interface of my TOTDOWOHO(I)CBATCI. We’ll start with a tune by The Clash, mainly because the internet has yet to evolve enough bandwidth to allow the upload of one of Yes’s 3-week song-cycles all in one go. (TM?)

The one I’ve gone for is “Rock the Casbah”, a lively little ditty from 1982 which is actually quite a long way removed from the punk sound for which the band is best known, and closer to the crossover pop of Big Audio Dynamite, the band which musical mainman Mick Jones fronted after The Clash’s implosion It’s catchy as hell, and was by some margin the band’s biggest hit in the States.

“Rock the Casbah” (as I read it) is a song about disobeying authority in the name of rock ‘n’ roll; however, because of the middle-eastern lyrical references, it has sadly (and, given The Clash’s political leanings, ridiculously) been adopted by the American right-wing and military as a gung-ho anthem during the “war on terror”. The words “Rock the Casbah” were apparently even painted on the side of US bombs in Iraq and Afghanistan, to the intense chagrin of Clash lyricist and singer, the late Joe Strummer, a man who loathed imperialism in all of its manifestations. (Seriously, you can’t imagine a more brain-dead significance-missing piece of yee-ha Yankee sloganeering; it’s almost equivalent to McDonalds glorying in daubing Morrissey’s “Meat is Murder”on the top of their burger boxes.)

Sorry, that’s quite enough tree-hugging lefty-liberal ranting from me - enjoy The Clash’s late-career pop masterpiece (… and await with dread the Wagnerian-lengthed Yes track which must inevitably follow at some point…)

It’s been a slightly contradictory few weeks in the Tafkass household music-wise, in that I’ve been poring over Pat Gilbert’s brilliant biography of punk icons The Clash, whilst at the same time listening pretty incessantly to Yes’s 1974 prog epic “Relayer”.

For anyone unaware, The Clash were, along with the Sex Pistols, the most influential punk band. Punk came along in 1976 as a direct reaction to the “dinosaurs” of stadium, and particularly progressive (or prog), rock - of whom possibly the most reviled of all were Yes - with the aim of giving rock ‘n’ roll music back to the kids. And they succeeded.

The Clash’s story is brilliantly told by Gilbert; full of genuinely exciting chaos and passion framed by the cultural melting-pot of mid-late 70s London. The personalities, the privations and excesses, the commitment to the cause politically, musically and even fashion-wise, and of course the inevitable crash-and-burn: it all makes for riveting reading. The band are still hugely loved, and massively relevant today, with a lot of the right-wing evil which Joe Strummer railed against once more on the march. I loved it so much I’ve since bought a couple of Clash biopic DVDs, which I can’t wait to watch, in order to put faces and voices to names.

I sincerely doubt that I’d ever buy a Yes biopic DVD - there’s probably not a lot story-wise beyond interminable studio noodling and endless world tours, constant line-up changes with one extremely gifted but phenomenally boring musician replacing another, and the only excesses / privations being a retinue of thousands of barely-used guitars, or singer Jon Anderson occasionally unable to find his kaftan.

However, when we switch to the music itself, it’s a completely different story. The Clash undoubtedly wrote thrilling tunes, were brilliant live and very capable musically, but, beyond the usual “Greatest Hits” compilation fare, their short, barking songs occasionally infused with reggae are of limited appeal to me, no matter how lyrically worthy. Despite my interest in their story, I don’t own every Clash album, and I haven’t listened to their masterpiece “London Calling” more than a handful of times.

On the other hand, I’ve been listening to “Relayer” constantly during the last month, and have done so hundreds of times over the 20+ years I’ve owned it - and it’s not even my favourite Yes album. It’s a mighty high-prog jazz-inflected beast with only three tracks; the first, “The Gates of Delirium”, is based loosely on Tolstoy’s “War and Peace” and weighs in at 22 minutes. The other two tracks are a paltry 10 minutes each (although of course, this is still about 3 times longer than any Clash tune). The time-changes, the interplay of musical themes, and above all the unabashed expertise - especially in the form of Steve Howe’s running, melodic guitar soloing - still make the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, even after so many repeat performances. Yes’s best pieces (to me) are like puzzles you have to unpick - but once you’ve listened to an album enough times to know all of its complexities, it’s pure joy to revisit it any time, and especially after a break of a year or two, during which time you always forget QUITE how brilliant it is…

And this is a crucial factor in the rivalry of prog and punk; one which is often ignored. As Vic Reeves said in his (very funny) autobiography Me:Moir, once things changed in the late ’70s, every kid cut their hair and played at being a punk in public, but many looked forward to the privacy of their bedroom where they could listen in peace to Yes, ELP, Genesis and Uriah Heep. Punk, of course, had a far wider cultural impact which shaped (and continues to shape) so many walks of life outside music, but interestingly, despite this wider cultural impact and 30+ years of derision in the music press, the music of prog is still the bigger seller, both in terms of album reissues and live ticket sales.

An (as always) long-overdue change to my TOTDOWOHOICBATCI; this year’s first offering is a gem from Nik Kershaw, one of only two famous musicians* to hail from my home town of Ipswich (the other being the lead vocalist of comedy metallists “Cradle of Filth”, Danni Minogue, or something.)

“The Riddle” is the title track of Kershaw’s second album, and it’s brilliant. The lyrics are frankly wacky (although to be fair, he does give us fair warning of this in the title.) In fact, oblique lyrics seemed to be the ’80s pop artist’s stock-in-trade (look up the lyrics of most tracks by Duran Duran, Spandau Ballet, Tears for Fears etc, and they are usually utterly impenetrable; sixth form poetry on acid) - Kershaw might well be taking the rise gently out of some of his peers. Or there may actually be a riddle… I’ve never worked it out. (Chez?)

The melody is simple and incredibly catchy; I defy you to listen to this a couple of times, and not then go around for the rest of the day humming “da-da tree by a river de-de hole in the ground, la-la dum-dum-de-dum-dum goes around and around”. By contrast the chord progression is fairly tricky-sounding, but surprisingly easy to play on a guitar - indicating which instrument it was composed on, despite its synthy production.

Kershaw is most often likened to fellow big-haired intelligent pop-purveyor Howard Jones, but there are also several likenesses to Sting; namely i) both were serious musicians who’d already been “payin’ dues” for several years before hitting paydirt slightly late with a teeny fanbase (thanks in no small part to judicious use of hair product); ii) both were liberal in the employment of a reggae lilt to lend a rhythmical hook to their early hits; and finally iii) both were known to engage in 18-hour tantric sex sessions with members of Amazonian rainforest tribes who’d had dinner plates inserted into their upper lips**.

As “pop” goes, this kicks seven shades out of the crap we endure today; never mind today’s endless highly-choreographed “Glee” routines, the processed hi-NRG guff which TM listens to whilst pumping iron, and the armies of manufactured, immediately forgettable indie-folkie-twee girlies and dishevelled posh blokes whose dads own the record company - this is a real song, composed on a real instrument by the person who ended up performing it, and repeatable by the same person 25 years later on the same instrument. I’d like to see any Cowell acolyte do a convincing solo version of one of their hits NOW, never mind in 25 years’ time.

It’s official - Nik Kershaw rocks, and Ipswich was clearly the centre of the musical universe in the 1980s.

(* - apart from i) Tommy Stupid of legendary skate punks The Stupids, and ii) the now-forgotten performer of a daring note-for-note cover version of  Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up”, which ran to an impressive 300 7″ vinyl copies in 1987.)

(** - this one might not be true.)

As my regulars probably know and are sick to death of hearing about by now, I sell vinyl & CDs on eBay for a living. One rather dank, secluded creek within the great river of music which is surprisingly fecund sales-wise is brass band albums. I’m not really sure why - mind you, the population of Yorkshire apparently tops 5 million, so that probably explains it, even taking into account the fact that most of them don’t have electricity yet.

Anyway - I was listing an LP by the Metropolitan Police Brass Band dating from 1980, and had to share the cover with you. Bear in mind that these were the “glory” days of the now-disbanded SPG, who used to delight in beating to death, or at least the crap out of, ethnic minorities during the many and varied protests which were taking place in London in the early years of Thatcher’s premiership. Clearly you were unlikely to see black or Asian people actually in the Metropolitan Police at the time, let alone in its brass band, but the album’s marketeers obviously felt that it was important not to seem overtly racist… solution? Lots of lovely cuddly token ethnic kids on the cover. And one of the band wearing a leopard skin (?). The Magic of the Met indeed.

T’s latest TOTDOWOHOHCBATCI might not be to everyone’s taste, but the majority of my remaining 1.5 readers will undoubtedly agree (given that I’m one of them) that it’s an expression of the finest musical virtuosity to rival Rachmaninov, Du Pre or even Gaga. It’s guitarist Joe Satriani playing probably his signature piece, “Flying in a Blue Dream”, from the 1989 album of the same name. Satriani came to prominence in the late ’80s, during an “arms race” of increasingly spectacular rock guitarists, all competing to out-do the others in terms of speed, technical proficiency and foreign-sounding names. Eddie Van Halen was one of the first, superseded by the likes of Satriani, Steve Vai, and Yngwie J Malmsteen  (who clearly takes the plaudits in the latter category).

Their sort of expertise demanded that the guitar be the main instrument in the piece (rather than a vocal part), and this has unfortunately (if often fairly) led to the music being mocked as “widdly widdly” guitar playing. Granted, speed and technique were often expressed at the expense of soul, but I think that Satriani gets the balance just right here; the melody is kept simple in the first “verse”, but then followed a fantastic improvisation on the theme in the second, and a blistering rock-out of a middle section (thereafter, from about 3 mins in, it pretty much repeats to the end.)

Like I say, it’s not for everyone; but if you’re a reasonably-capable-but-lazy guitarist living in the Folkestone area who enjoys listening to technically brilliant rock music through headphones and air-guitaring whilst looking in the mirror, all the time pretending that “I could do that if I put my mind to it” but never actually putting his mind to it and almost certainly being delusional about his abilities in the first place, then it’s absolutely ideal. I’m sure that description represents a fairly broad demographic…

1989: whilst mere mortals contemplate switching from their Spectrum or Commodore to an Amiga or some valve-and-sea-water-powered games console, madman Tim Berners-Lee is writing proposals for a network of hypertext protocol thingummies which will come to be called the World Wide Web and which, he dreams, will eventually come to dominate the industrialised world. At the same time, Prince (soon to become known as The Artist Formerly Known as Prince, later known as The Artist Formerly Known As The Artist Formerly Known As Prince), still glowing from the critical triumph of his brilliant 1987 “Sign of the Times” set, is touring his subsequent slightly flabby, self-indulgent “Lovesexy” album.

They were heady, portentous times indeed - in the following 5-10 years, the globe’s political landscape would change beyond recognition; suitably inspired by these epochal changes and all they portended, I would blaze a ground-breaking trail through a low 2:1 degree at college followed by a couple of meaningless jobs at which I failed; and, of course, the internet would indeed go on to dominate the economies of the industrialised world, largely through work-time lost to pornography. (Oh, and Prince and his alter-egos would release a series of increasingly flabby, self-indulgent albums.)

Now in “Twenty10″, however, it’s clear that this “World Wide Web” upstart has had its day; it is no longer relevant - Prince has said so. Eschewing all traditional portals, and expert on irrelevancy that he is, he’s chosen instead to release his latest not-at-all-flabby-or-self-indulgent album exclusively via the thrusting new upcoming exciting media platform of (da-da-da-da-da-da-DAAAAA) -  the Daily Mirror.

Sorry Princey-poo-poos; I know it’s easy to be cynical, and I was VERY much a fan of yours; I still remember fondly doing my paper-round in summer ‘88 with “Lovesexy” exclusively on my headphones; I still remember the crushing disappointment when you cancelled that London gig in ‘87, the one I’d saved* for ages to see; and of course, I still remember your best stuff very fondly - but for Christ’s sakes, when your biggest hit is out of date by 11 years, it’s time to shut up about what’s relevant and what isn’t. Act your age: marry an obvious gold digger; adopt a poor Tierra-del-Fuegian orphan-child with no limbs and incurable palsy of the arsehole; get religion (oh, you did); go on “I’m a Celebrity”; hook up with Kaja-frigging-Googoo on an acoustic pan-pipes “’80s greatest hits” tour; do SOME flipping thing - just don’t hector the rest of the world about the internet (or iTunes / Friends Reunited / binary code / whatever.)

(* - OK, nagged my parents for the money and never paid it back)

Crivvens! A new TTOTDOWOHOHCBATCI - and it hasn’t even been a full month yet! Anyone would think that I was sitting at home on a Friday night with nothing to do and no prospect of entertainment apart from watching fifth-time-repeated back-to-back episodes of “Mock the Week” on Dave (or the snooker*.)

Ahhh, but summer is looming, my sap is rising, and I’m once again breaking out my Kula Shaker collection for sun-kissed top-down bucolic in-car listening. Please be stifling that giggle; Kula Shaker were a seriously good band. Part of the second (or maybe third) wave of Britpop in the mid ’90s, they were breathtakingly exciting live, with an extremely tight and talented band playing classic rock riffs under the trademark roar of lead vocalist Crispian Mills - imagine a cross between Led Zeppelin and Pink Floyd, with a soupcon of “All Things Must Pass”-era George Harrison thrown in. Ultimately, though, they were stymied by a) the “Indian mysticism” theme running through their music and lyrics, which became something of an albatross around their collective necks, and relegated them in the minds of many to “Darkness” novelty stakes, b) a lot of inverse snobbery surrounding Mills (son of actress Hayley and from an undoubtedly very privileged background) and c) a fairly vicious right-on press campaign following some ill-judged comments from Mills about swastikas. Although that sort of thing never worried Bowie.

This offering, “Govinda”, is one of many outstanding tracks from their debut oeuvre “K”. The album sold by the bucket-load, so you can undoubtedly pick up a copy on Amazon for 1p - and it’s a worthwhile investment, despite having possibly the worst cover art since Whitesnake’s “Love Hunter”. Note a) the rock-tabulous beginning and ending, and b) the fact that, rather cleverly, the song SUGGESTS the major third in the 1-3-5 triad of the main chord, but (apart from in the vocal part) only uses it very sparingly, and indeed repeatedly teases us with the MINOR third. (Riveting, eh?)

(* - Don’t worry, things haven’t got THAT bad yet…)

Another TTOTDOWOHOHCBATCI update (I’d say “belated”, but they look to be averaging out at around one a month, so this is pretty much on cue), and it’s a second appearance for latterday progsters Marillion. The song in question is “Waiting to Happen”, from their second “different lead singer, not the enormous Scottish bloke you probably remember, but another fella who has a great voice but sounds as if he may have a case of mild sinusitis, you know, a bit like Rory McGrath” album, entitled “Holidays in Eden”. It’s a very sweet acoustic-driven number about the love finally found by someone who had given up on the idea.

It’s nice enough, but if I’m honest, slightly mushy for my palate. I can take it or leave it - that is right up ’til the last 50 seconds or so, when guitarist Steve Rothery cuts loose, turns on the rock afterburners and launches into an unexpected-chord-change-tastic full-on cojones-out up-to-eleven axes-aloft wig-out (with a delicious fade-out coda on the piano), which I haven’t been able to get out of my head for the last two days, and which brings the song up disproportionately in my estimation. And yours as well, if you have any taste.

Actually, if I rationalise it, the fact that I’m enormously ambivalent about the bulk of the song with its warm, emotional-but-mature “never give up on the hope of love” lyrical theme, yet still (19 years after first hearing the song) get ludicrously excited about the soaring arpeggiatorial majesty of the guitar solo at the end might just offer a clue as to how my own “vie d’amour” is destined to progress…