Number one for four weeks from w/e 8th September 1984
By 1984, producers and bands were filling singles to their maximum run times, stuffing the turkey baster with the chorus and then ramming the grooves right up to the record label with its repetition. Even outside of some (mostly pointless and hastily cobbled together) extended twelve inch versions, songs often sprawled beyond their natural run-times and outstayed their welcomes.
“William, It Was Really Nothing” is probably my favourite Smiths song because it steps so far outside this usual structure while also fizzing to the brim with ideas. It comes across as a pile-up of grievances, a betrayed rant in song form, starting with an almost jaunty melody from Marr, before Morrissey whines “The rain falls hard on a humdrum town/ This town has dragged you down”, repeats himself, then adds “and everybody’s got to live their lives”. You’re immediately invited to envisage him strolling agitatedly through some red-brick suburban overspill with no discerning features.
It then makes a huge lyrical leap, using the town not as a reason to sympathise with the predicament of the person the song is aimed at, but to accuse them of building their own prison. William, whose life is “nothing”, is accused of staying with a fat girl – the only bit of the song I feel uncomfortable with, surely the main problem with her isn’t her obesity? - whose only aspiration in life seems to be marriage.
The song feels split in two halves. The first section sets the scene, and Marr and the rest of the Smiths are sprightly and busy throughout, setting you up for the idea that this is going to be an antsy tune about suburban ennui. Following the lines “God knows I’ve got to live mine”, though, things shift, the guitar begins to twang on a despairing line, then we get to the chorus and Marr’s fingers seem to blur through a furiously picked but very pretty and Byrdsian jangle. The chorus repeats once before the whole lot bends and folds like a house of cards, leaving only some ambient inconclusive guitar chords ringing.
It feels as if a tornado has appeared, thrashed around the edges of town, then left a few stray pieces of metal to rattle and sing out as it collapses. The effect is spectacular and surprisingly pretty – rarely do you hear a piece of music where betrayal and fury sounds so fussy and intricate, like a carefully designed doily with “fuck you” written in the centre – a song about courtship and romance where Marr’s guitar lines chime slightly like wedding bells in places, but do so with agitation not celebration.
Morrissey mentioned that “William It Was Really Nothing” was his attempt at writing an anti-marriage record for men, noting that women were always being told to leave their partners on singles, but men had little advice of their own to go on. There’s a slight tone of misogyny to the fact that he picked a “fat girl” as the central focus for “William” – I’m surprised female Smiths fans stood for this – but the song dares to observe that some women become unhealthily obsessed with marriage and begin to use it as a bargaining chip in relationships in a way men more often won’t.
I first witnessed this myself at a university party, where the partner of a friend of mine began drunkenly raging at him that she wanted to get married, “AND IF YOU WON’T DO IT I’LL FIND SOMEBODY THAT WILL!” My twenty-year old friend went pale and speechless, then did the sensible thing and dumped her not long afterwards, obviously not wanting the imminent future of babies and marital bliss mapped out for him before he’d even held down a job or possibly even worked out who he was.
Not all young men are so strong willed. Some are so doped up on love that they do as they’re told, against the advice of bolder friends and members of their family**. These stories tend not to be blasted everywhere. It reflects poorly on the man, who is seen as feeble and insincere, and badly on the woman who is cast as old-fashioned, pre-feminist, weak and manipulative. Above even that, though, it’s seen as an insult to the glorious and sacred tradition of marriage; hinting that a marriage might be based on insincere foundations is worse than suggesting someone’s children might be ugly. The song is another example of Morrissey deliberately choosing to pick a topic riddled with uneasiness.
There’s another possibility, of course. Many people have observed that the “William” in the song might be Billy Liar from the book and film, and could be referring to the prudish Barbara for whom the idea of marriage appears to be a utopian state of being. Others have disagreed and suggested that it’s about a gay man*** getting married purely as an attempt to live a “normal” life in a conservative town. While that can’t be proven, the waspishness and fury of the song does make more sense if you hear Morrissey as William’s spurned lover, and hear his rage about some “fat girl” as spite and jealousy. This doesn’t change the scenarios I’ve outlined above, however. Marriage under pressure, whether it’s due to shame, or unhealthy coaxing from society or the person’s partner, always feels strangely rigid, cold and doubtful, and runs the serious risk of self-destructing, just like the last few moments of this single. It’s just not usually as pretty, that’s all.
This single is also obviously noted for containing two of The Smiths' most famous and celebrated B-sides, "How Soon Is Now" and "Please Please Please Let Me Get What I Want", meaning a proportion of its sales must be attributed to their presence. We'll be touching on "How Soon Is Now" once it finally emerges again as an A-side.
(* - although Wire seemed to give up on this idea after “Chairs Missing”, and even much of that album features standard-length songs).
(** - these things and worse can also happen to women, obviously, to the extent that it’s a problem which still urgently needs tackling… but that’s not what we’re being given space to address here).
(*** - many sources point to the fact this song may be about Billy MacKenzie of The Associates. Neither side has verified this).
New entries elsewhere in the charts
Week One
16. Folk Devils - Beautiful Monster (Folk)
Peak position: 3
Nearly two minutes of steady and pulsing guitar work slowly erupt into a track so abrasive and grinding its difficult not to be gripped. “Beautiful Monster” screeches, rattles and roars around your head, making even groups like The Fall seem scratchy and weak, then settles down again like a dog fallen tired after an aggressive barking spree.
There were many ways to create a great big bloody racket after punk rock, but “Beautiful Monster” feels more surprising than most of the ones we’ve heard.
17. Break Machine – Are You Ready? (Record Shack)
Peak position: 17
The final Break Machine hit (though only just). They never entered the UK Top 40 again. “Are You Ready” is all anticipation and build up and no real event. They ask the question, but the goodies we’re supposed to be getting ready for never really arrive. It’s got a raucous bounce which might tempt you to dance under certain circumstances, but anyone with memories of their first hit could be forgiven for feeling a bit cheated by this point.
19. Jonathan Richman & The Modern Lovers - That Summer Feeling (Rough Trade)
Peak position: 19
Finding himself dropped by Sire Records, Richman was swiftly decamped to indieland from 1984 onwards, and “That Summer Feeling” was the first of his demoted efforts. “That Summer Feeling” takes a simple early rock and roll subject matter and adds dread and regret to the equation – if the Beach Boys were living in the now in “Fun Fun Fun”, Richman’s broken voice seems to be cracking with either overpowering nostalgia or regret later in life. Whether you live that wild youthful summer or screw up and miss it, you’ll be haunted, he warns us, either haunted by missed opportunities or by an innocence that can never be recaptured.
He’s not wrong, but as he staggers through the song guided by The Modern Lovers crawling along, you have to wonder why he wanted to remind us of the unavoidable reality. Hearing this truth expressed so simply feels worse than hearing a song about death, somehow.
22. Yeah Yeah Noh - Cottage Industry (In Tape)
Peak position: 14
28. The Cool Notes - You’re Never Too Young (Abstract Dance)
Peak position: 21
Abstract were one of the first indies to create a sublabel purely for pressing up the most appealing dancefloor hits the major labels didn’t want to scoop up for themselves (though in reality, it seemed to be mostly reserved for the use of The Cool Notes). As the major labels have often been the slowest to realise emerging club trends, this approach would increasingly pay off in the indie sector in general, to the extent that the late 80s are going to be a very interesting and varied period for this blog.
South London’s The Cool Notes didn’t quite hit the Top 40 with the misspelt “Your Never Too Young” – a loud tut for whoever let that pass – but would eventually score a proper hit for the label. “Your Never Too Young” is typical smooth club fare for the period, twinkling and dazzling smoothly, the sound of both urban romance and a slick, polished dancefloor.
29. 400 Blows - Groove Jumping (Illuminated)
Peak position: 29
Week Two
10. Inca Babies - The Judge (Black Lagon)
Peak position: 8
For anyone mourning the absence of The Birthday Party from their lives, Inca Babies offered some consolation. It’s not as if they were quite as chaotic – “The Judge” has a tautness and discipline Nick Cave’s boys would probably have sneered at – but for some that would have been a plus. It’s taut as well as furious, and feels closer to rock and roll than free-wheeling anarchy as a result.
For me personally, though, it quickly locks into a groove I find too predictable and lacks anybody with charisma wild enough to fling it around the room until it bleeds.
15. Dead Can Dance - Garden of Arcane Delights EP (4AD)
Peak position: 4
By this point 4AD were really forging a clear identity for themselves musically as a label, as well as visually. Aussie signings Dead Can Dance slotted smoothly alongside The Cocteaus and This Mortal Coil to create a movement which sounded more like a scene than a label.
The opening track on this EP, “Carnival Of Light”, is filled with staccato hammer dulcimer sounds, wailing vocals and a sense the melody is hundreds of years older and a thousand times more foreign than any of the evidence suggests. Elsewhere, the antiseptic haze invents shoegaze several years too early – mind you, the Cocteaus also did that.
18. The Wolfgang Press - Scarecrow EP (4AD)
Peak position: 18
Although Wolfgang Press released their debut LP “The Burden of Mules” in 1983, this was their first 45rpm offering. While their sound has a logical place on 4AD at this point, unlike their labelmates their sound is broad and occasionally threatening rather than simply mysterious. Opening track “Ecstacy” would be woody and rural sounding were it not for the anguished cries and panicked saxes which only go on to envelope the entire song.
19. Psychic TV - Unclean (Temple)
Peak position: 19
Genesis P Orridge’s post-Throbbing Gristle gang were signed indirectly to CBS via Stevo’s Some Bizarre records, a label which tended to specialise in leasing its master tapes to major labels rather than playing the indie distribution game.
There’s rarely been a group less suited to a major label than Psychic TV, so the fact they ended up releasing records via their own Temple imprint in 1984 felt like an inevitability. A character as bizarre as Orridge was never going to simply get a job at a dry cleaners after being dropped, and there was already a sense of self-sufficiency about him despite his eccentricities.
“Unclean”, though, is a track which shows Wolfgang Press how chilling, discordant music is really done. The music is edgy and chilling enough in itself, sounding like the soundtrack to the weirdest mashed-up guy at the goth’s club torture dungeon (something most of us have avoided thinking about at some point in our lives, even though we were assured it definitely existed) but the art film accompanying it features skulls and hanging men juxtaposed with shirtless giant skinheads sitting among the neon lights of Piccadilly.
The whole thing would have been enough to suspend other groups to the extreme fringes, but Psychic TV spent much of the eighties nibbling away at the edges of the mainstream, and this is far from the last time we’ll need to think about them.
24. The Fits - Action (Trapper)
Peak position: 21
29. The Higsons - Music To Watch Girls By (Upright)
Peak position: 4
By 1984 The Higsons had returned from a brief one-single stay on the Two Tone label which probably did more harm than good; the label may have been respected, but the scene which birthed it was beginning to feel like something from another era, with most of its main players either folded or playing to increasingly selective audiences.
If you want to see their cover of Andy Williams’ (or more precisely Tony Velona’s) “Music To Watch Girls By” as being a somewhat cynical last bid for a hit single, I suspect you wouldn’t be far wrong. Despite owning a copy myself, it rarely lands on my turntable, suffering from a problem common to most cover versions – it’s just too damn respectful. The Higsons version sounds as if it would be more likely to blast from a fifth-hand Ford Cortina than the sleek Cadillac of the original, sounding earthier and more hormonal, but it doesn’t do a great deal more than pump the track up a little.
It ensured that the group managed more press attention, publicity and airplay before fading from view entirely, though, and even prompted Andy Williams to write them a letter to thank them for bringing new life to one of his old favourites. Charlie Higson’s parents must have been beaming with pride after seeing that. It also ensured the group were a highly fashionable ten years early for the mid-nineties easy listening revival, not that this was widely acknowledged when that scene did finally roll into town.
30. Felt - Sunlight Bathed The Golden Glow (Cherry Red)
Peak position: 10
One of Felt’s finer early moments balances simple stomping rhythms and Lawrence’s braying, yelping vocals with Deebank’s thrillingly intricate guitarwork and swooping basslines, a mix of sweet and jazzy and simple and sour.
Felt never quite fitted in with the alternative scene in 1984, picking up disdain from John Peel among others for their “pretentious” fussiness. For those who knew what they loved, however, they became a huge cult concern.
Week Three
12. GBH - Do What You Do EP (Clay)
Peak position: 7
GBH never really developed into anything commercial, but the deeper you dig into their catalogue, the more they seemed to predict the shape of some things to come. More than a few players on the yet-to-emerge Midlands Grebo scene loved the group, and while “Do What You Do” is still metal influenced punk rock, the restlessness and anthemic nature of it is only one distorted beatbox away from being an early PWEI or Gaye Bikers single. More on whom eventually, obviously.
15. Screaming Dead - The Danse Macabre Collection EP (Angel)
Peak position: 15
The final Screaming Dead single until they reformed in the 21st Century, this shows them developing into something closer to a commercial goth sound without giving way enough to save them from their demise. This still has a hard punk edge to it, and by 1984, that was a hinderance rather than a help.
23. Bill Nelson - Acceleration (IDS)
Peak position: 4
24. Paul Haig - Big Blue World (Crepuscule)
Peak position: 17
Paul Haig was producing fascinating and complex pop music in 1984, and its strange that during an era which was so open to big-sounding but twitchy ideas he didn’t make more headway. Production and arrangement wise, “Big Blue World” isn’t unlike a lot of other sizeable hits of the era, and its own restlessness is probably the only thing that counted against it.
Week Four
No new entries – sorry. Though it's not my fault.
Peak position: 4
By this point 4AD were really forging a clear identity for themselves musically as a label, as well as visually. Aussie signings Dead Can Dance slotted smoothly alongside The Cocteaus and This Mortal Coil to create a movement which sounded more like a scene than a label.
The opening track on this EP, “Carnival Of Light”, is filled with staccato hammer dulcimer sounds, wailing vocals and a sense the melody is hundreds of years older and a thousand times more foreign than any of the evidence suggests. Elsewhere, the antiseptic haze invents shoegaze several years too early – mind you, the Cocteaus also did that.
18. The Wolfgang Press - Scarecrow EP (4AD)
Peak position: 18
Although Wolfgang Press released their debut LP “The Burden of Mules” in 1983, this was their first 45rpm offering. While their sound has a logical place on 4AD at this point, unlike their labelmates their sound is broad and occasionally threatening rather than simply mysterious. Opening track “Ecstacy” would be woody and rural sounding were it not for the anguished cries and panicked saxes which only go on to envelope the entire song.
19. Psychic TV - Unclean (Temple)
Peak position: 19
Genesis P Orridge’s post-Throbbing Gristle gang were signed indirectly to CBS via Stevo’s Some Bizarre records, a label which tended to specialise in leasing its master tapes to major labels rather than playing the indie distribution game.
There’s rarely been a group less suited to a major label than Psychic TV, so the fact they ended up releasing records via their own Temple imprint in 1984 felt like an inevitability. A character as bizarre as Orridge was never going to simply get a job at a dry cleaners after being dropped, and there was already a sense of self-sufficiency about him despite his eccentricities.
“Unclean”, though, is a track which shows Wolfgang Press how chilling, discordant music is really done. The music is edgy and chilling enough in itself, sounding like the soundtrack to the weirdest mashed-up guy at the goth’s club torture dungeon (something most of us have avoided thinking about at some point in our lives, even though we were assured it definitely existed) but the art film accompanying it features skulls and hanging men juxtaposed with shirtless giant skinheads sitting among the neon lights of Piccadilly.
The whole thing would have been enough to suspend other groups to the extreme fringes, but Psychic TV spent much of the eighties nibbling away at the edges of the mainstream, and this is far from the last time we’ll need to think about them.
24. The Fits - Action (Trapper)
Peak position: 21
29. The Higsons - Music To Watch Girls By (Upright)
Peak position: 4
By 1984 The Higsons had returned from a brief one-single stay on the Two Tone label which probably did more harm than good; the label may have been respected, but the scene which birthed it was beginning to feel like something from another era, with most of its main players either folded or playing to increasingly selective audiences.
If you want to see their cover of Andy Williams’ (or more precisely Tony Velona’s) “Music To Watch Girls By” as being a somewhat cynical last bid for a hit single, I suspect you wouldn’t be far wrong. Despite owning a copy myself, it rarely lands on my turntable, suffering from a problem common to most cover versions – it’s just too damn respectful. The Higsons version sounds as if it would be more likely to blast from a fifth-hand Ford Cortina than the sleek Cadillac of the original, sounding earthier and more hormonal, but it doesn’t do a great deal more than pump the track up a little.
It ensured that the group managed more press attention, publicity and airplay before fading from view entirely, though, and even prompted Andy Williams to write them a letter to thank them for bringing new life to one of his old favourites. Charlie Higson’s parents must have been beaming with pride after seeing that. It also ensured the group were a highly fashionable ten years early for the mid-nineties easy listening revival, not that this was widely acknowledged when that scene did finally roll into town.
30. Felt - Sunlight Bathed The Golden Glow (Cherry Red)
Peak position: 10
One of Felt’s finer early moments balances simple stomping rhythms and Lawrence’s braying, yelping vocals with Deebank’s thrillingly intricate guitarwork and swooping basslines, a mix of sweet and jazzy and simple and sour.
Felt never quite fitted in with the alternative scene in 1984, picking up disdain from John Peel among others for their “pretentious” fussiness. For those who knew what they loved, however, they became a huge cult concern.
Week Three
12. GBH - Do What You Do EP (Clay)
Peak position: 7
GBH never really developed into anything commercial, but the deeper you dig into their catalogue, the more they seemed to predict the shape of some things to come. More than a few players on the yet-to-emerge Midlands Grebo scene loved the group, and while “Do What You Do” is still metal influenced punk rock, the restlessness and anthemic nature of it is only one distorted beatbox away from being an early PWEI or Gaye Bikers single. More on whom eventually, obviously.
15. Screaming Dead - The Danse Macabre Collection EP (Angel)
Peak position: 15
The final Screaming Dead single until they reformed in the 21st Century, this shows them developing into something closer to a commercial goth sound without giving way enough to save them from their demise. This still has a hard punk edge to it, and by 1984, that was a hinderance rather than a help.
23. Bill Nelson - Acceleration (IDS)
Peak position: 4
24. Paul Haig - Big Blue World (Crepuscule)
Peak position: 17
Paul Haig was producing fascinating and complex pop music in 1984, and its strange that during an era which was so open to big-sounding but twitchy ideas he didn’t make more headway. Production and arrangement wise, “Big Blue World” isn’t unlike a lot of other sizeable hits of the era, and its own restlessness is probably the only thing that counted against it.
Week Four
No new entries – sorry. Though it's not my fault.
For the full charts, go to the UKMix Forums
Number One In The Official Charts
Stevie Wonder - "I Just Called To Say I Love You" (Motown)
No comments:
Post a Comment