Yep, it’s time to lie back on the shrink’s couch and ‘tell me about your childhood’.  Well.  Sort of.  Actually, my mum just happens to be in town, so I reckon that on Fresh Air Radio this week I might just play all sorts of mum songs, just for shits and giggles.

This came about because of the following comment by my brother on the thread about music formats this week:

“I need to at some point clarify Mum’s music taste for your readers because the poor woman just constantly gets dismissed as a ‘pop fan’.  

The poor woman has a massive collection of jazz, blues; a truly encyclopaedic Opera and symphonic collection and yet, one Lighthouse Family album and the poor woman’s whole musical taste just goes whooosh out the window while Dad is sanctified while you merrily ignore his David Grey albums.  Albums with an emphasis on the plural!”

Now, as you might well know by now, I am a philistine, so mum’s classical music and whatnot means absolutely bollocks-all to me.  However, I think it needs to be pointed out that I most certainly do not ‘dismiss’ my mum as a pop fan.  I fucking love the pop stuff she used to play around the house when we were growing up, and if anything it was my mum’s stuff which first properly got me into music in the first place.

On air from 3:30pm UK time – listen live here.

So for all I do indeed call her a pop fan, which she most certainly is, I do not at all mean that to be a dismissal.  As you will find out on Fresh Air today, when I will be playing all sorts of shite from my mum’s record collection.  And of course, seeing as I left home in 1993, it will be enormously 80s-tastic!

And now, while we’re at it, for the Friday Fives. Honestly, I doubt I can do much better with these questions than I’ll do with the music I’m going to play this afternoon, but Mrs. Toad and I were talking about doing a Saxcast this weekend, so I thought I might ask for some help.

1. Which instrument would you like to see get the saxophone Total Taboo treatment?
2. Best super cheesy 80s sax tune.
3. Acceptable use of sax.
4. Awesome Great Big Eighties Pop Song!
5. Most eighties of all eighties movies.

Song, by Toad’s Friday Fives radio tracklisting for today:
1. David Bowie – China Girl
2. Meat Loaf – Dead Ringer for Love
3. Bow Wow Wow – Aphrodisiac
4. Sparrow & the Workshop – Devil Song (Live)
5. Erasure – Sometimes
6. Bruce Springsteen – Dancing in the Dark
7. Withered Hand – Cornflake (Fresh Air Session)
8. Mike MacFarlane – Waltz (Fresh Air Session)
9. Simple Minds – Don’t You Forget About Me
10. Kate Bush – Running Up That Hill
11. The Magnets – Ever Fallen in Love (Buzzcocks cover)
12. ABC – Poison Arrow
13. Meursault – Lament for a Teenage Millionaire (Fresh Air Session)

I know I hammer on about guilty pleasure on this blog a lot mostly, I would imagine, because I am an incredible snob and so some of the things I used to listen to horrify me.  If you think I judge you by the shit you listen to, just think how twisted and confused that mockery must become when turned inward upon the giant Hydra of Hypocrisy which dwells inside me.

Fuck it though, I am not going on about that today, but that is the reason for the songs I have chosen, so before you start sniggering just think how hard this has been for me and try and show some compassion, you horrible people.

Recently I have been getting into a lot of software trouble with Final Cut Pro and various web streaming technologies, which is most, most frustrating.  I fixed everything by doing what you are supposed to do in these situations: head to the internet and read forums where someone, somewhere has almost certainly had the same problem in the past and see how they themselves fixed it.

I still find that kind of daunting though, I have to confess.  The idea of all the poking about in config files, which they tend to recommend, scares me just a little bit, as if deleting the wrong file would suddenly make the whole fucking computer go on fire or something.  It reminds me of my parents and their increasing disconnect with technology, actually. They simply do not have any of the instincts to fix simple things in ‘preferences’ or to go and find a file which their internet browser may have downloaded to a strange location or something like that.  I fear, in my wariness of getting too deep into config and system files, that I too may be just on the verge of letting technology escape me just a little.  Not that I was ever a computer whizz to begin with of course.

Anyhow, this site has a number of regular commenters, for whom I am deeply grateful because it gives the place an aura of authority which I myself would never achieve on my own.  However, for those of you thinking about making your first comment (and I know there are a lot of you) it must seem a bit cliquey, so on Friday I open my arms to the lurkers out there and suggest you take this chance to say hello for the first time.  It’s the perfect opportunity of course, because not one lick of sense will be talked on this site all day, so no matter how silly your contribution, you can guarantee it won’t be the silliest.

That will be Bart.

1. Technology which is getting away from you a bit.
2. How techie are your parents?
3. Favourite low-tech item in regular use in your house.
4. Best really fucking complicated invention.
5. Best really fucking simple and extremely bloody obvious invention.

Cyndi Lauper – Time After Time

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Alison Moyet – Steal Me Blind

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Elton John – I Guess That’s Why They Call it the Blues

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Meat Loaf – Dead Ringer For Love

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

Huey Lewis & the News – The Power of Love It is a simple and unarguable truth that anyone worth their salt loves Back to the Future.  And anyone who loves Back to the Future must have at least a sneaking soft spot for this song.

Audio clip: Adobe Flash Player (version 9 or above) is required to play this audio clip. Download the latest version here. You also need to have JavaScript enabled in your browser.

There’s only time for a real quickie this week as I am working my hairy little buttocks off on the Broken Records stuff at the moment.  Still, in your insatiable thirst for pointless, self-indulgent rambling I was sure you’d want to listen to something splendid in the meantime.

There’s no underlying theme to anything either I’m afraid, just me rattling on about some current and very interesting music, as well as a couple of confessions so shocking you may never come back here again.  Looking at the playlist, I’m sure you can guess which ones they are.

So good luck with this, and I am already looking forward to the next one.

Toadcast #25 – The Quickcast[audio http://media.libsyn.com/media/songbytoad/ToadcastNo25.mp3]

01.  The Futureheads – Broke Up the Time (02.02)
02. Tapes ‘n’ Tapes – Hang Them All (05.05)
03. Meursault – Pissing on Bonfires/Kissing With Tongues(13.21)
04. The Byrons – Azerbaijan (19.13)
05. The Fire Engines – Candyskin (26.04)
06. The Close Lobsters – Firestation Towers (28.53)
07. Mighty Mighty – Law (34.21)
08. Kim Carnes – When I’m Away From You (41.14)
09. Meat Loaf – Took the Words Right Out of My Mouth (44.32)
10. Dirty Summer – War is Bad, Bono is Great (50.02)
11. The Low Lows – Dear Flies Love Spider (53.40)
12. Sargasso Trio – It’s Hot in Hell (58.32)
13. The Extraordinaires – High Five the Cactus (63.11)
14. Modernaire – Distraction (69.40)
15. The Indelicates – Point Me to the West (75.47)
16. Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds – Night of the Lotus Eaters(83.47)

Yes, you did read that correctly.  Meat Loaf.  Fuck off.

I was writing about bands selling out a couple of days ago and the phrase ‘the anti-popular reflex’ cropped up. Now, there are plenty of instances of bands genuinely selling out that we covered in that post and the subsequent comments, but I thought this particular phenomenon needed a little more idle chatter devoted to it. Hooray, I hear you say.

I have an instinctive and barely controllable anti-popular reflex whereby no matter how much I like something, as soon as it starts to become hugely popular I find it very difficult to maintain my enthusiasm. Sometimes this goes so far as to instinctively hate things simply because they are so popular. I can’t bring myself to watch Lost, for example, despite the fact that plenty of people whose opinions I respect keep telling me how good it is. And if I did watch it, it would be with that wrinkled up nose a little child gets when forced to eat brussel sprouts.

I think a lot of indie lovers suffer from this, and I think there are a couple of reasons, one trivial and one a little deeper.

The trivial one is that we indie lovers care quite a lot about music, and the general public does not. We care about music and form close bonds of loyalty with our favourite groups because no-one else likes them and it can feel that our evangelism on their behalf is important for them. Whether this is true or not is a moot point, but it can often feel that way. When these groups get popular it can be impossible to maintain that intense relationship because, well, if they’re special to several million people then it’s stretching the definition of the word special a little, isn’t it.

The slightly (only slightly though, don’t look so scared) deeper reason is this: most indie lovers are alternative types in general. Virtually none of us were from the cool set in school, nor are we amongst the champagne and martinis set now we are older.

To those not at the beating heart of all things cool, this makes the attribute of coolness something which can be oppressive, condescending, and demeaning, not least because those in the inner circle tend to guard their status rather jealously. Many of us react to this by redefining cool as being the things we ourselves most like, rather than the things that the vagaries of fashion and public clamour tell us we should like, but this is still a slightly defensive position. What is held up to be cool in the magazines and on the telly is popularly defined as being better, at the direct expense of everything else.

The stance – well, my stance anyway – is ‘Fuck off, who the fuck do you think you are to look down your nose at me you vacuous, bovine imbecile. What makes you think I give a shit what your opinion is of my lifestyle, or care the slightest fig for your herd mentality, you hollow, empty shell of a human being, you.’ Or some such. My relationship, and I don’t think I am alone in this, with the world of high cool is a fractious one at very best.

So when bands I love go mainstream this hostility towards things in the upper echelons of the hierarchy of popularity can kick in and overwhelm the actual warmth I may feel for the music. And equally, if I first hear of a band or a TV program or a pair of trainers simply because they are already very cool, it is highly unusual that I will think anything other than ‘Ah right, just more shit the masses venerate for no reason whatsoever. Just like they venerated that stringy transvestite Sarah Jessica Parker. Or those vapid cunts in The OC. Or that self-indulgent idiot Pete Docherty. Or that unbearable shitfest Titanic (Oscars, that film actually won Oscars).’

So it may not always be entirely reasonable, but I don’t think the anti-popular reflex is completely unfair.

The Magnetic Fields – Famous
The Endrick Brothers – Star of the Silver Screen
The Beatles – Honey Pie
Ben Folds Five – Underground
The Extraordinaires – Seeds of Jealousy
And now the kicker. Yes, I am actually going to ask you to listen to Meat Loaf. Yes I own this album and no, I didn’t have to go and buy this song just for this post. Snigger all you want, but if you listen to the lyrics and replace the girl in question with your favourite music and the anti-popular reflex (reason #1) is perfectly described.

Meat Loaf – More Than You Deserve