serene’s posterous

IPods were on my mind recently. I came upon this old article about
iPods by Steven Levy:

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/14.11/ipod_pr.html

Apparently, the first song played on an Ipod is Groovejet (If This
Ain't Love) by Spiller. The vocals of the song were by Sophie
Ellis-Bextor. The video is quite amusing, showing how the very tall
(reportedly over 6'9") Cristiano Spiller copes with Bangkok, while
Sophie Ellis Bextor looks luminous in a tuk-tuk.

Song 2 isn't the only song by Blur, even though it is probably the
most well known of their songs in the US. Blur always have had
entertaining music videos. The Universal is no exception. It is a
riff on Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange. Check out the eyeliner on Damon
Albarn...

Beautiful South was formed by the former members of the Housemartins,
Paul Heaton and Dave Hemingway. Their songs usually have great catchy
tunes. Then you would realize they were actually singing about
alcoholism and other depressing or barbed topics.

I like this song because of the story it tells, about love as you grow
older. "You can't have too many good times, children; You can't have
too many lines; Take a good look at these crows feet; Sitting on the
prettiest eyes."

Here's a link on youtube.

One of my favorite songs by James. James is an English rock band from
Manchester that is sometimes compared to the Smiths. I am not sure
why, but it seems that almost every rock band out of England is
compared to the Smiths. James just released a new studio album after
a long hiatus, and I just found out that James would be touring the US
in September/October. I am so tempted to go up to the city to catch
them live, because judging from the live performances I have seen on
DVD, they are great performers. Update: We are going!

Everything but the Girl, like the Housemartins, were also from Hull,
England. Everything but the Girl is a 2-person band made up of the
couple, Ben Watt and Tracey Thorn. They are probably most famous for
the Todd Terry remixed song "Missing" (...And I miss you, like the
deserts miss the rain...). This song, Protection by Massive Attack,
is a cool piece voiced by Tracey Thorn. Tracey Thorn has a really
tender and emotive voice.

Housemartins was another slightly obscure English pop band from the
1980s. This was the single that helped them become a little famous in
the UK, probably because the video had cool plasticine figures of them
dancing. Watch out for Norman Cook, otherwise known as Fatboy Slim,
in his younger days.

Prefab Sprout are a quirky English pop band, most famous for their
songs in the 1980s. They never made it really big, but many were fans
of their intelligent songwriting. This song, "Cars and Girls", was
reasonably well known. It is supposedly a response to Bruce
Springsteen's lyrical style then. "Some things hurt more much more
than cars and girls..."

A soulful song from the 1980s by Wet Wet Wet that I used to listen to
a lot. They were probably most famous in the US for the overplayed
"Love is all Around" from the movie "Four Weddings and a Funeral".
They weren't exactly a groundbreaking or exciting pop band, but were a
good listen. Marti Pellow looked gorgeous back then too.

Cathy Dennis is probably more famous for having penned Britney
Spears's "Toxic" and Kylie Minogue's "Can't Get you Out of my Head"
than for her singing. This is her cover of The Kinks's "Waterloo
Sunset", a song written by Ray Davies and one of the best songs about
London. The song begins at about 00:40 in this video.

Roddy Frame, then of Aztec Camera, with an atypical cover of Van
Halen's Jump. This version is performed live on some TV show, but he
also has other versions (in hard-to-find Japanese compilations) with a
long electric guitar solo.