Day 15 – Another Girl, Another Hit Song
The continuing adventures of “Eric’s Trip Around the Sun”. One final trip with the iPod.
There are times when I listen to the show “Sound Opinions” that I am in awe of both Jim Derogatis and Greg Kot. I am in awe, not due to their opinions being superior than mine but they carry a lofty amount of historical knowledge that they can roll off the history of a band off their tongue. True, I understand that they are not doing the show live and a high level of research is put into each show. But also, part of being a host is trying to outclass the audience, i.e. throw a Young Marble Giant reference to give credibility to whatever the fuck you are talking about. 9 people will not get the reference and the 10th is probably stoned off his gourd anyhow.
However, being a music fan is often a constant process of researching out a particular band or genre.
It’s having that “Oh Shit!” moment when you stumble across something that’s been staring at you in the face for years and never delved deeper than the surface. This is pretty much what I am about to discuss with you today.
Several years ago I purchased, Rhino’s ‘No Thanks!: The 70s Punk Rebellion’, 4-disc boxed set. It clearly contained some very obvious classic punk songs from the era but then others that might have been buried if I was putting the collection together myself. For me, it was a treasure trove of having a snapshot of an era that was slightly before my time and get a glimpse of everything that it had to offer.
One of these songs was, The Only Ones, ‘Another Girl, Another Planet,’ the hit song from this obscure (from my perspective) band from England. The song itself captures a certain charm between the whiny lyrical delivery style catchy pop nature of the song. To me, it’s a dead ringer as a catchy twin of the Plimsouls. ‘A Million Miles Away’.
While I would seek out psychedelic rock as my main inspiration, I get all soft when I hear good guitar-oriented pop songs that don’t feel generic or mass produced. More cowbell, less Hoobastank. With this particular song however, I am not certain as to why I had never really looked beyond what I had heard on this boxed set.
There was very little that I knew about them, in fact, I could not guarantee that I would have heard anything else by them. I found out, after the fact, that this song had been covered by Blink 182.
Note: This did have the potential of starting over entirely and writing about something completely different as ‘Blink’ does not fall into the type of bands that I would want to be associated with. Since I am on a constant deadline of trying to churn a story out a day, this is not really in the cards. I am not sure whether I could say the same if Nickelback were inspired by them.
They do not remind me of some of the more confrontational bands of the era nor the experimental punk bands but a combo of some American acts such as The Heartbreakers and Big Star and even a little Cheap Trick. So I am intrigued and at the same time dismayed that there is, alas, another band that I need to do my homework on.
But music plays these games with you. It’s the idea of listening to an album years after you purchased it only to finally “Get It” or even the opposite occurring, a song or album that you could not put down that you cannot stand. We are still making it through the A’s and there is still so much more to reminisce and explore.
• Unrest – Angel, I’ll Walk You Home
• Pink Floyd – Another Brick in the Wall (Part 3)
• Galaxie 500 – Another Day
• Arcade Fire – Antichrist Television Blues