Blondie - Eat to the Beat

At the end of the 1980s, Rolling Stone famously awarded the Clash's London Calling with the accolade of best album of the decade, ignoring the fact that it was released in 1979. If Rolling Stone were looking for a blueprint to pop music and culture in the 1980s then they could have picked another record released in 1979, Eat to the Beat by Blondie.

Parallel Lines is generally heralded as the essential Blondie purchase. However, this rather ignores the aural delights of its follow up, Eat to the Beat.

Whereas early Blondie releases such as their self titled debut and Plastic Letters often harked back to US 50s nostalgia, Eat to the Beat brings with it a sheer diversity of styles underlining how far popular music had come, and where it could go in the future.

From the pop reggae of Die Young Stay Pretty, the dramatic punk fusion of Victor and the title track, the theatrical lullaby of Sound-a-Sleep and the Motown influenced Slow Motion, Eat to the Beat sets the tone for the collision of styles that made the 1980s what it was.

Eat to the Beat's melting pot of ideas also advances the pure pop template that might be used to describe Parallel Lines greatest moments.

Blondie's dystopian disco anthem Atomic is Eat to the Beat's most well known song yet the albums more tender pop moments like the ethereal Shayla and the twin mini epics of Dreaming and Union City Blue are where the record really shows its heart.

Eat to the Beat is really the first time that the concept of the art of the music video was fully consumed by a major recording artist. A separate Eat to the Beat video album was released by the group which included promotional films for all 12 songs on the album.

The promotional videos produced for the Bowie-esque The Hardest Part and the aforementioned Atomic are amongst the most iconic of the era. Despite being performance led and with production values that would be seen as limited by today's standards, both conjure up convincing nightmare visions as the world moved closer to the Orwellian prophecies of 1984.

The use of cameos by band associates such as hip hop guru Fab Five Freddy and the first bona fide supermodel Gia Carangi in a lot of their promotional material also opens out the sense of Blondie being part of something much wider. For this brief moment in time they were the biggest band on the planet, with an entourage of hipsters who they were able to make famous too. It seems somewhat apt that The Hardest Part uses David Bowie's Fashion as a musical template.

Eat to the Beat is yet further proof of Rolling Stones accidental assumption that the 1980s, despite being the most futuristic and forward looking of times, started before the decade had even begun.

The Filth and the Fury - A Sex Pistols Film

The story of the Sex Pistols is one of the most well known in the history of rock. There is probably very little that has not been said before, yet do not let this deter you from taking an opportunity to enjoy Julien Temple's the Filth and the Fury.

As someone who was a witness to events and took the opportunity to catalogue the Pistols rise and fall on film during this period, Temple is ideally placed to produce this retrospective.

Similar in style to his recent Dr. Feelgood documentary Oil City Confidential, Temple uses a combination of contemporary interviews and archive material from the 1970s to place the Pistols within their social context. It is sometimes said that the initial punk explosion happened so quickly and affected just a handful of people that it was over before it had properly begun.

Temple's use of Bay City Rollers Top of the Pops performances, Tommy Cooper and Michael Fish weather broadcasts interspersed with a narrative attempting to tell the story of the Sex Pistols sympathise with this blink and you miss it view of the punk revolution.

This is refreshing as too many other Pistols rockumentaries overegg their impact on mainstream British culture at the end of the 70s. Ultimately, the Sex Pistols were a moral panic and cult phenomenon whose existence and essence sparked inspiration in the world of music, film, art and fashion. Mr and Mrs Smith in Croydon did not change their consumer choices, even if their offspring did.

The Filth and the Fury is very much the members of the Pistols opportunity to tell their side of the story. Temple's previous work with the group, the Great Rock and Roll Swindle, was criticised for being Malcolm McLaren's version of events.

The contemporary interviews film the Pistols in shadow silhouette, creating the impression that Messrs Lydon et al. are former SAS servicemen, forbidden from having their true identity revealed due to their past operations and service.

The McLaren point of view is that the Pistols were essentially his play things and that the group were just as manufactured as the Bay City Rollers. The Pistols themselves, and John Lydon in particular, take a contrary view. What is clear is that one could not have happened without the other.

The Lydon/McLaren relationship is key to understanding the Pistols. Both had a strong combination of intelligence, articulacy and daring which made the Pistols appear that they were the most important band in the world.

The film is strongest when it uncovers Lydon's motivations behind the Pistols and the Johnny Rotten persona. Lydon explains that the Pistols genesis was born out of the frustration of successive Labour government failures to help the working class. The ability of the Conservative party to make inroads into the southern working class vote in most General Elections since punk up to 1997 backs up Lydon's point.

Lydon is the outsider within his own group. He didn't have the strong bond that existed between Cook and Jones who ultimately sided with McLaren. Lydon does not disguise his contempt for Matlock and McLaren. His one positive relationship was with Sid Vicious which eventually deteriorated due to Sid becoming more and more of a drug addict, his relationship with Nancy Spungen and Sid attempts to ape the Rotten persona. Lydon expresses regret for not explaining to him more about what to expect before he joined the group and is shown to still be visually affected but Vicious's death to this day.

Whether the Filth and the Fury is the definitive account of the Pistols is debatable. That accolade is probably best reserved Jon Savage's book England's Dreaming. However, in the Filth and the Fury, Julien Temple has produced an extremley stimulating and visual take on one of the greatest stories in the history of popular music.

Yes, Prime Minister - The Key

As someone who has spent all of their professional life in a political environment The Key, the fourth episode of the first series of Yes Prime Minister, represents an excellent introduction to understanding the competing tensions when governing in the United Kingdom.

For those unfamiliar with the series, the three main protagonists are Jim Hacker the Prime Minister, his Principal Private Secretary Bernard Woolley and the Cabinet Secretary Sir Humphrey Appleby.

The three characters are pivotal in ensuring that Britain is governed, yet each have different objectives and it is these differences that are most starkly drawn out in The Key.

Furthermore, The Key sees the introduction of a new character Dorothy Wainwright, the Prime Minister's political adviser. Dorothy has her own agenda which she seeks to protect and is just as important a player as Hacker, Sir Humphrey and Bernard.

The plot to The Key is basically a turf war between the civil servants and politicians over not one but two keys to power.

The first key is the theoretical key of the office occupied by Dorothy which enables her to observe the activities of political colleagues and civil servants alike. Sir Humphrey desperately wants to reclaim this room for the civil service in order to weaken Dorothy's grip on the Prime Minister.

The second key is that of the actual key to access the Prime Minister's Private Office. Sir Humphrey consistently ignores the fact his position does not necessitate that he has access to this office, and so Hacker, on the advice of Dorothy, decides to enforce procedures to stop Sir Humphrey entering the office at will.

The corner of the civil service in this turf war is fought principally by Sir Humphrey yet it is not the elected politician Hacker who is fighting the politician's corner most vehemently but the party political appointee Dorothy Wainwright.

Effectively Hacker and Woolley are caught between the two. Whereas for Sir Humphrey and Dorothy the fight is about preserving their respective positions, both Hacker and Bernard are unfulfilled in their objectives and both realise they need political and civil service support in order to achieve their aims.

Hacker is a new Prime Minister looking to implement his "grand design" yet is up against resistance from the civil service. Bernard is a high flying career civil servant who is aiming for the top yet is caught between the short term need to please his immediate master the Prime Minister as well as the more long term objective of satisfying his civil service superiors who will ultimately determine Bernard's career trajectory.

Despite being in conflict, Dorothy and Sir Humphrey are effectively two sides of the same coin. Both have reached the summit of their ambitions and therefore seek to preserve both the purity and influence of the institutions they represent, as well as their own personal position.

The episode ends very much as it begins with nothing much changing, Dorothy retains her room and Sir Humphrey gets his key back. Both positions are preserved.

However, due to Jim Hacker and Bernard's use of the political and bureaucratic skills at their disposal the events of the episode underline that power ultimately resides with the Prime Minister and his Principal Private Secretary when managing the competing tensions between politicians and civil servants.

It is these competing tensions that are fundamentally the backbone of governing in the United Kingdom.

Roxy Music - For Your Pleasure

Amongst the albums considered influential to alternative music in the 1990's, one of the most overlooked is Roxy Music's second album For Your Pleasure.

Ferry, Eno et al combine to produce one of the most exhilarating insights into debauched suburban dystopia of the 1970's.

This small town glamour aesthetic is felt strongest on In Every Dream Home a Heartache, the stand out track half way through the album.  Bryan Ferry's paean to a plastic inflatable sex doll. 

"Immortal and life size; my breath is inside you"

There is something truly compelling and sinister about Ferry's delivery in this song.  Is the doll purely an object for sexual pleasure or does it represent something far more darker?  Does Ferry's "perfect companion" with "skin like vinyl" represent a lack of fulfillment in human relationships generally?

"I blew up your body; but you blew my mind"

In Every Dream Home a Heartache also provides one of the most dramatic endings of any Roxy Music song.  A multi layered song that deals with our own personal isolation in an unforgiving universe.

For Your Pleasure is far more than a one trick pony however. Whereas the likes of Strictly Confidential, The Bogus Man and the title track are amongst Roxy Music's most experimental work, Editions of You, Grey Lagoons and Do the Strand are up there with their easily accessible output. 

"One thing we share; is an ideal of beauty"

For Your Pleasure's influence on 90's alternative music was greatest on bands that may be considered "intellectual romantics".  Bands who dreamed of escape to the big city.  Searching for a twisted glamour and decadence as depicted by the cover image of For Your Pleasure.  Pulp and Suede were the most successful, yet the impact can also be found on bands with more modest success such as Strangelove, Denim and Marion.

"The memory of your face; deep in the night; plying very strange cargo"

Ferry approaches Beauty Queen with a nonchalant swagger clearly later imitated by Brett Anderson and Jarvis Cocker.  Along with David Bowie, early period Roxy Music is one of the first truly successful attempts in British popular music to perfect an image for beautiful losers and draw people to the outsider chic. 

Songs like In Every Dream Home a Heartache would not appear out of place on 90's albums like Dog Man Star, and like that more contemporary example, For Your Pleasure signified the untimely end of a successful musical association.

In both cases, fans were left wondering what might have been.  For our pleasure, we have to console ourselves with what is left.

Welcome to Up On The Catwalk!

I am probably very late to this blogging game, however, I have just woken up to the idea that I have strong and definite opinions on various aspects of popular culture and that I want to share them with cyberspace and the world.

I understand that in order to make a successful blog you need to have a niche and I can confirm my manifesto for Up On The Catwalk is to regularly review music, television and films from the 60's, 70's, 80's and 90's.

As my world view is from the United Kingdom most of my cultural reference points come from there, yet I hope that people will be able to use this blog to enhance their own popular culture interests, and generate debates and discussions no matter where you come from.

I hope you enjoy taking the time to visit Up On The Catwalk!

Tom