The CaB 'Desert Island Discs' Thread

[alan nagsworth]

After a dismal thirty-one posts in 2007, ELW10's thread is long dead and it's high time we did another one of these. It's like the top 10 albums thread, only with songs instead of albums, and there's only 8. Also there's some other stuff, and it makes you think!

[ELW10 COPYPASTA] Desert Island Discs demands that you pick:

Eight records - ie, single tracks (length unimportant).
One book, aside from the Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare.
One luxury of no practical use.
The one record you'd pick if you could only take one. (Put this in bold)

Remember, Desert Island Discs is about nostalgia and the way music reflects key events in your life - it's not necessarily just a bunch of your favourite records. Although people pick stuff for all sorts of reasons. Write a brief justification for each choice, though - make sure it's something more interesting than 'Just a great record basically'. Tell us what it reminds you of, or whereabouts in your life it transports you. [/ELW10 COPYPASTA]

Nagsworth's Desert Island Discs

Ween - Push Th' Little Daisies
The first song I ever heard by the band who would in years' time become the greatest musical influence on my life. Simply the most spectacular band, and even when I first heard this around age 17 or so and took it to be a stupid one-off, it would always make me incredibly happy for no strict reason. Years later and it may not be my favourite song but it takes me back to that initial discovery of something so unfathomably inviting and wonderful, it makes my heart swell and of course it's just a really silly love song, for which it gets bonus points.

Panda Bear - Slow Motion
This seems to be a song I can never tire of hearing, and Lennox's music never fails to send me drifting off into a blissful reverie. This would be one of those songs that helps me to escape the loneliness of the island, for sure. Gorgeous bit of surf pop.

The Stranglers - Golden Brown
Another song I could listen to on repeat for the rest of my life. It is also the favourite song of my other half, and was most definitely the initial spark whereupon I realised I was quickly falling in love with her. I remember putting on a playlist of my most beloved tunes to impress her and she casually said, "Oh, this is my favourite song!" That was it for me. Not long after on that day, we sat in my kitchen and watched a ferocious storm ravage my back garden. I'll never forget that day.

of Montreal - Your Magic Is Working
Another from the heady time during which I fell hopelessly in love, this one I introduced to her and told her it summed up exactly how I felt when I thought about her. That ol' corny mixtape aesthetic, shoving all subtle connotations and subtexts aside in favour of "THIS SONG MAKES ME FEEL LIKE HOW I FEEL WHEN I LOOK AT YOU". It worked, though, didn't it?

The Beatles - I'm Only Sleeping
Often rumoured to be a song about John getting stoned and zoning off by bored recreational dope heads who think that every song by a band linked to drug use is subsequently related to drug use, it's really quite apparent that it's nothing more than Lennon singing about how much he loves a good lie in. I don't think any other song carries the simple, dreamline vibes like this tune does. Every time I hear it I feel like I'm pulling a duvet right up to my chin and burying my face into a pillow. This is another track I'd need on the island to help keep my mind relaxed and free of woe.

Neutral Milk Hotel - Oh Comely
I quickly memorised the lyrics from the getgo of first hearing this track and it's probably my all-time favourite song to sing REALLY LOUD - so loud that at the end of the song, you can hear that barely-audible shout of "holy shit!" from the booth when it was recorded. Raw, aching passion in a straight-up folk song with incomprehensible lyrics. Alone on an island? SING LOUDER THAN EVER BEFORE.

Dead Kennedys - Police Truck
First DK song I ever heard, aged about 14 and playing Tony Hawk's Pro Skater, wondering what the hell they might be saying in the censored bits, such as "Pull down your dress, here's a kick in the ass / Let's beat you blue [til you shit in your pants]" and "Don't move, child, got a big black stick / There's six of us, bitch [so suck on my dick!]". The song was great enough already and when I heard it in full, I was aghast. Amazing. Don't think I could ever live alone on a desert island without being able to thrash out once in a while, so this one comes with me.

Oneida - Sheets Of Easter
Fourteen minutes long. The same incessant droning of two simple chords as Kid Millions' drums bore endlessly into your skull. The most loud, pounding and repetitive song I've ever heard and loved with a burning passion. For the days where I feel like it's Groundhog Day and nothing has meaning any more, this song would be played on repeat until I realised that some things in life were still slightly less repetitious. Still, even if it took all day to realise, the song fits almost perfectly four times into an hour, so it'd be a pretty good way of keeping the time. Also works effectively as a soundtrack to bashing my head off trees to shake the coconuts loose. The amount of practical uses this song has are seemingly infinite, and for that I think I have to say that this is my one tune I could not live without.

The Book & The Inanimate Object

The Complete 'Peanuts' 1957-58
In a somewhat controversial move, I've decided to pick a comic book. The work of Charles Schulz has been an inspiration on my life since I could first pick up a book with my infant paws. From steadily appreciating the humour at a young age to seeing the reflections of a troubled but brilliant mind reflected in the childlike personas contained within, I have taken more wisdom and insight from the simplest of four panel strips than I care to recall. Because of the life-long association and the deep, profound comforts brought to me through Schulz's strips, and with this collection roughly being my personal favourite time in his career, this would be the one book I'd choose to take with me.

A framed photograph of the missus.
Is it weird that I actually feel a lump in my throat just thinking about it? That bright face full of cheery disposition and beautiful emotion would give me the energy to get up and carry on every morning, and soothe me to sleep every night. Lord knows if I had to live without her, I couldn't go more than a week without seeing her smile.

Woo! Yeah! C'mon! List 'em, Danno!

[Why I Hate Tables]

Table Discs

1. Rowland S Howard - Dead Radio
I've written before on here about the impact hearing the Teenage Snuff Film album had on me, making me fall in love with guitars all the more, turning me from a music fan to an obsessive, but it bears repeating. Like just then. This has to be the one, being the opening track where the grainy 50's guitars creep around as Rowland sings that immortal opening couplet "You're bad for me like cigarettes, but I haven't sucked enough of you yet". I'll forever associate it with meeting someone who I've fallen out of touch with but lingers on in my mind now and then - he was probably the most beautiful person I've ever seen but the way he's gone that's probably not the case now. Just hearing the opening chords is all it takes to remember seeing him leaning against a wall in an ash stained jacket just outside the bus station, a cigarette in his hand, waiting for me. It was a Saturday afternoon and already going dark at this point, and thinking of that one moment is all it takes to send a shiver down my spine. Handy if it gets too warm, really.

2. Lou Reed - Street Hassle
A long track I can just get lost in, and a song I never get tired of hearing. The ending just hits me in the heart every single time, Bruce Springsteen's drowned in reverb cameo always makes me laugh and the intro just sounds like someone walking around angrily, something I'd probably wind up doing a fair bit.

3. Tom Waits - Hold On
This is just probably the most comforting song I can think of. Hearing it I learnt that an artist can reach out to someone they've never met and probably never will just by writing something. Again, there's a few lines and moments in it that just send me speechless everytime, too.

4. Beach Boys - Surf's Up
Guessing after a while I'd stop laughing at the fact I was a beached boy. This is also one of those "Wow, so you can do that with music" moments and means a lot to me. If I could have that bootleg version with the long instrumental intro that would be ideal, too.

5. Jesu - Star
Another one I can't get sick of listening to - probably because it brings me back to another moment that makes me smile, a Halloween party of all things, walking through the cold and fog to get there listening to it and having to put it on repeat. The day this song stops making me feel optimistic you can shoot me, even if it does sound a bit like it should be soundtracking one of those "Running to the airport to meet your love" moment. In fact it soundtracked walking into town to have an enjoyable night with several people in drag, a closet case and my closest friend dressed as one of Kiss. Close enough.

6. Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds - The Mercy Seat
Another "power of music can make you feel unstoppable even when you're a small, thin and weak little idiot" moment - this has never sounded as good as that first time I heard it at full volume and the screeching feedback did my ears in and made me grin like a moron. Nothing personal, though - few other pieces of music do either.

7. Annie - Chewing Gum
The song that brings out my oft hidden love of stupid, camp dancing about - and that'd need some outing on the island at some point (maybe even constantly after I went insane).

8. Magnetic Fields - I Thought You Were My Boyfriend
This is the song that keeps giving. Just makes me smile everytime I hear it, the fusion of Stephin Merrit's miserable git voice and what sounds like a chamber orchestra trying to imitate the Pet Shop Boys via Shannon's Let The Music play. First heard it at a time of realisation, too.

Book
Simon Reynolds - Rip It Up and Start Again or Energy Flash
Simon Reynold's writing at best can be better than the music he's writing about - discovered that while leafing through both books. As a music obsessive myself, the music it would make appear in my head just reading it would be very welcome.

Luxury Item
As I'm on a desert island and going mad, it's got to be the teddy I've had as long as I can remember. Could either delay the insanity or speed it up, when I think it is a real bear and that I am now king of the animals.

[Famous Mortimer]

Spacemen 3 – "An Evening Of Contemporary Sitar Music"
Picking a song from my favouritest band ever ever is a bit tricky, but this one will do as it's nice and long and has loads of ideas in it that were used in "Playing With Fire".

The Beatles – "Strawberry Fields Forever"
Took over my life for ages when I was a kid, listening to it on broken stereos so I could pick up the left side of the mix better, stuff like that.

King Missile – "Double Fucked By Two Black Studs"
Not the first song of theirs I heard, and not even the best, but it makes it onto my desert island due to the massive laugh I had when I first played it and for its excellent suitability for mixtapes.

Faust – "Krautrock"
About as good as music can get, I reckon. Utterly amazing.

Negativland – "Christianity is Stupid"
Showed me what can be achieved by a wicked sense of humour and a machine to cut tape up. As did...

Cassette Boy – "Saltgrain"
Even though "Fly Me To New York" is their most famous one, I have a personal love for this, if only to hear them make Mike Skinner say "Cassette Boy think my brain is in my arse".

Bongwater – "His Old Look"
Or is it "His New Look" that I like? Anyway, the one that ends with Ann Magnuson dancing in the sand. A great story, interestingly told, and great musical backing too, which only meets with the lyrics once.

Stetsasonic – "All That Jazz"
Got me into rap music, and means I have a lot to thank it for.


Book
The "Baroque Cycle" by Neal Stephenson, as it's absolutely brilliant, and I've not read volume 3 yet either.

Luxury Item
Bag of Minstrels

Hmmm...I think that'd do. I might fiddle, but I'll let the 31-year old me have this one. PS old me, the Baroque Cycle was great.