During the 80s, the heyday of standalone B-sides, there were dozens of these little miracles from Prince (Erotic City), the Smiths (Asleep), the Jam (Butterfly Collector), Depeche Mode (But Not Tonight), REM (Ages of You), Pixies (Winterlong) and New Order (1963). And a few 90s bands dignified the industry's CD-single overload, including Blur (Young & Lovely), Pulp (Like a Friend), Radiohead (Talk Show Host) and Saint Etienne (I Buy American Records). Some songwriters should perhaps have been more frugal. Like a giddy pools-winner, Noel Gallagher blew his initial songwriting bounty on bonus tracks (Acquiesce, Half the World Away) when he would have been better off holding something back for the lean years.
There's a wonderful meritocracy with B-sides. Bad ones are quietly ignored while good ones get promoted. In the days of vinyl, DJs sometimes overruled record labels and started playing the flipsides instead: Rock Around the Clock, Unchained Melody, I Will Survive, Maggie May, How Soon Is Now? and Born Slippy all started out as bridesmaids. Others became album tracks (The Cure's 10:15 Saturday Night) or came to feel like ones via popular collections (Buzzcocks' Singles Going Steady, the Smiths' The World Won't Listen).
"Thou shalt not extinguish thine anger, but shall master it,
that thy conscience may not be blunted by adjustment
to wrong causes."
-The Dutch Ten Commandments to Foil the Nazis
No comments:
Post a Comment