Cocktails and Records

All this talk of the now sadly departed raconteur Malcolm McLaren has singularly failed to commemorate his contribution to my early life.

Long before I discovered punk, or indeed any music beyond Culture Club and my Dad’s Beatles records, I knew Malcolm McLaren as the man behind the groovy skipping song ‘Double Dutch’.

This single, with its natural exuberance celebrating the important things in life for an 8 year old, kicked off a huge skipping fad in our school playground. And for once I wasn’t standing on the sidelines wondering what the fuss about. No, it was quite clear from the film clip I’d seen on Australian Sunday night music staple Countdown that skipping was not like the usual rubbish sports like cricket or netball. Skipping was COOL.

So here’s to you Malcolm – for not only helping change the course of music but for managing to get sport hating bookworms like me out of library (for the weeks that the song was in the charts anyway).

‘…The skip they do is the double dutch, that’s them dancing…’

Malcolm McLaren, ‘Double Dutch’, 1983

They Might Be Giants
Anna Ng

For some strange reason this song has been trapped in my head for the past few days. And for some even stranger reason, rather than just playing the actual record, I decided to look it up on youtube.

And I’m glad that I did – what a clip! It’s just so ridiculously mid to late 80s indie/college radio looking. This style deserves a genre of its own I think:

1. pointless surrealism e.g. fish swimming upside down
2. random use of black and white, slow motion and extreme close-ups to indicate artiness
3. bizarre ‘dance’ moves
4. band members looking moody
5. type used as a graphic device by flashing unreadable/irrelevant words across the screen
6. any existing intelligent and relevant subtext only known to the band and the director
7. top, top tune

See also: REM, The Church, New Order, The Pixies, Throwing Muses, 10,000 Maniacs <insert your own favourite late 80s star indie act here> etc. etc.

When I’m not reading children’s books and listening to jazz-funk, I like to go to the cinema…

This week I’ve been to see This Sceptred Isle, a package of holiday memories from the British Film Institute archives. The screening allowed me to wallow in nostalgia for long lost holidays I never had – coach tours around the B roads of Britain (c.1958), hop picking in Kent (c.1933), being blown along the Cornish Riviera with my long skirts and fancy parasol (c.1904) etc. etc.

But the place that I really want to be is Blackpool in 1957. Well, the Blackpool depicted in this fabulous film called Holiday made by British Transport Films. With its Chris Barber soundtrack, saturated colour and sheer gleefulness, Holiday is summer perfection. And they’ve got champagne on draught.

Excerpt from Holiday, 1957, BFI National Archive

What could be a finer way to spend an evening than with a martini and overwrought 1984 classic Oh Sherrie by ex-Journey frontman Steve Perry? This clip has everything:

1. a romance with a girl in a floaty white dress
2. trendy haircuts and eyewear
3. rebellion against the man
4. sudden bursting into song musical style
5. gut-wrenching singing from the heart

This, folks, is how you make a video: