






Five Things I Saw & Heard This Week
Transcripts from the everyday world of music by Martin Colyer







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ON THE MUSIC PLAYER
One of my favourite Christmas Songs,
Nellie McKay’s “Christmas Dirge”.

Why the great Nellie McKay is not a bigger star, I’ll never know — smart, funny, literate, a fine pianist, a great singer — but maybe her rebel nature stopped her being the Laufey of the 2000s… This song, sung to a woodsman, has some of the McKay essentials: lyrics that scan beautifully, a poignant melody, a radical vegan treatise wrapped in a Christmas bow. More power to you, Nellie!
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HERE’S A TAG CLOUD THAT HAS A FEW OF THE SUBJECTS COVERED ON FIVE THINGS
Aimee Mann Amanda Petrusich Aretha Franklin Barney Hoskyns Bill Colyer Bob Dylan Bruce Springsteen David Bowie Desert Island Discs Every Record Tells a Story Hot House Inside Llewyn Davis Janis Joplin JazzWax John Cuneo Joni MItchell Jonny Trunk Ken Colyer Leonard Cohen Levon Helm Liam Noble likeahammerinthesink London Jazz Collector Marc Myers Mark Pringle Martin Colyer Mavis Staples Michael Gray Mick Gold Miles Davis music Music Documentaries New Yorker Richard Williams Robbie Robertson rocksbackpages.com Ry Cooder Sam Charters Steely Dan Studio 51 The Band thebluemoment.com The Guardian US Esquire Van Morrison
SUPER HITS [!] OF THE SIXTIES! | ONE | “SEALED WITH A KISS”
I’d heard the song for the first time in years on one of the last episodes of the TV series, Mad Men. Brian Hyland’s 1962 puppy-love pop classic (#3 on both US and UK charts) has a naggingly dark/slightly hysterical melody that stuck in my head for days after watching the programme. On one hand it’s an over-ripe teen anthem, on the other a singular melody that doesn’t sound like a “pop” tune at all. Here‘s my version, part of a five song project covering songs from the 60s.
FOLLOW ON INSTAGRAM
BUY THE BOOK OF FIVE THINGS
HERE’S A TAG CLOUD…
Aimee Mann Amanda Petrusich Aretha Franklin Barney Hoskyns Bill Colyer Bob Dylan Bruce Springsteen David Bowie Desert Island Discs Every Record Tells a Story Hot House Inside Llewyn Davis Janis Joplin JazzWax John Cuneo Joni MItchell Jonny Trunk Ken Colyer Leonard Cohen Levon Helm Liam Noble likeahammerinthesink London Jazz Collector Marc Myers Mark Pringle Martin Colyer Mavis Staples Michael Gray Mick Gold Miles Davis music Music Documentaries New Yorker Richard Williams Robbie Robertson rocksbackpages.com Ry Cooder Sam Charters Steely Dan Studio 51 The Band thebluemoment.com The Guardian US Esquire Van Morrison
AND HERE’S THE ARCHIVE…
THE LATEST PROJECT: SUPER HITS [!] OF THE SIXTIES!

“SEALED WITH A KISS”
I’d heard the song for the first time in years on one of the last episodes of the TV series, Mad Men. Brian Hyland’s 1962 puppy-love pop classic (#3 on both US and UK charts) has a naggingly dark/slightly hysterical melody that stuck in my head for days after watching the programme. On one hand it’s an over-ripe teen anthem, on the other a singular melody that doesn’t sound like a “pop” tune at all. It’s the first track from a new project covering songs from the 60s.
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Aimee Mann Amanda Petrusich Aretha Franklin Barney Hoskyns Bill Colyer Bob Dylan Bruce Springsteen David Bowie Desert Island Discs Every Record Tells a Story Hot House Inside Llewyn Davis Janis Joplin JazzWax John Cuneo Joni MItchell Jonny Trunk Ken Colyer Leonard Cohen Levon Helm Liam Noble likeahammerinthesink London Jazz Collector Marc Myers Mark Pringle Martin Colyer Mavis Staples Michael Gray Mick Gold Miles Davis music Music Documentaries New Yorker Richard Williams Robbie Robertson rocksbackpages.com Ry Cooder Sam Charters Steely Dan Studio 51 The Band thebluemoment.com The Guardian US Esquire Van Morrison
ON THE MUSIC PLAYER: ONE OF MY FAVOURITE CHRISTMAS SONG

Nellie McKay’s “Christmas Dirge”. Why the great Nellie McKay is not a bigger star, I’ll never know — smart, funny, literate, a fine pianist, a great singer — but maybe her rebel nature stopped her being the Laufey of the 2000s… This song, sung to a woodsman, has some of the McKay essentials: lyrics that scan beautifully, a poignant melody, a radical vegan treatise wrapped in a Christmas bow. More power to you, Nellie!
Aimee Mann Amanda Petrusich Aretha Franklin Barney Hoskyns Bill Colyer Bob Dylan Bruce Springsteen David Bowie Desert Island Discs Every Record Tells a Story Hot House Inside Llewyn Davis Janis Joplin JazzWax John Cuneo Joni MItchell Jonny Trunk Ken Colyer Leonard Cohen Levon Helm Liam Noble likeahammerinthesink London Jazz Collector Marc Myers Mark Pringle Martin Colyer Mavis Staples Michael Gray Mick Gold Miles Davis music Music Documentaries New Yorker Richard Williams Robbie Robertson rocksbackpages.com Ry Cooder Sam Charters Steely Dan Studio 51 The Band thebluemoment.com The Guardian US Esquire Van Morrison
“For Once in My Life” is a song I first associated with Bennett and for the definitive ballad reading he nails it.
Lovely pic of Don Weller who played just as he looked no nonsense big toned tenor, speaking of which the best gig I ever saw at the Seven Dials was by the archetypical Texan sax giant Buddy Tate
Sorry, Mick, I’m just not a Bennett fan…
Harry Miller on bass in that great pic of Mongezi.
I need you to help me caption all these, Richard! My annotating skills were sub-par…
Looks like Keith Tippett on piano
Good to be reminded of that Aimee Mann track.
You can look up a couple of very decent Serpent themed soundtrack playlists on Spotify which soothe the nerves after biting your fingernails to the bone while watching the show.
Thanks a lot for reminding me of that ‘Osmond Bros destroy Stevie Wonder’ clip; I’d only just stopped having nightmares. Those BBC4 compilation programmes have no quality control at all, so you get absolute gems mixed up with audio torture.
I’m impressed that Perfume Genius is on your radar. Not being especially ‘down with the kids’ myself, I only know him because my nephew plays in his touring band. I wasn’t sure PG would amount to anything but it’s impressive how he has developed as an artist.
And how has your nephew coped with the touring gap, Kevin?
I have no doubt that he’s missed all the fun of being with his band buddies but he seems to have made the most of it, actually. Cooped up alone, with no other distractions, he’s just finished his second film soundtrack.
Yes, they seem to throw them together with a few odd facts as subtitles… Stevie did worse than most with their choices, I can’t forget Johnny Mathis and “Sir Duke…”
And I listen to anything that Blake Mills works on. I like the fact that he’s not satisfied being an astonishingly inventive and interesting guitar player — he has an artist’s sensibility and seems to draw special things out of those he produces. I love Laura Marling’s Semper Femina (although she found his committed methods challenging…) and I think the PG record is a leap in his production techniques.
I feel a Blake Mills playlist coming on. By the way, I’ve been listening again to the playlist compiled from your book – still sounds very good, very few that I skip.
That’s nice to hear… I will do a BM playlist and send you – there are some great odd tracks where he’s the featured soloist…