Christmas songs on loop, but plenty of room for some others:
Killing The Blues/Robert Plant and Alison Krauss. Wow! Something new on the F-C playlist. (The only time I ever get to hear anything new is on those freebie cds from The Word, which are great to just blindly pick from, burn onto a compilation and put in the car. If you like what you hear, then you go back and see who sings it. I never pick by artist for fear it might put me off. But that's just me). So I heard on Radio 2 and it blew me away immediately. The King of Rock meets the Queen of Bluegrass and never looked back. Dreamy slide guitar and vocals so tender you could eat them, as tears prick the backs of your eyes. The whole album's a corker too.
Clog Dance/Violinksi. Remember this instrumental folky ELO-y stomper from 78 or 79? It's way too much like ELO not be ELO, and it's on their record label too. Are they involved somewhere? Does anyone know? This is the sort of thing that became a surprise hit way back then, when more or less anything could make the charts. Now those days are gone. If Who Pays The Ferryman? were released today, it wouldn't bother the charts. TV themes don't become hits nowadays, do they?
I Feel Just Like A Child/Devendra Banhart. I've been resisting him for ages, finding his being responsible for the whole 'bringing folk to the masses' thing quite irritating, as surely that was me? Anyhoo, now I know where I've heard this voice before, on many adverts etc. Not mad on it. It's like a cross between Marc Bolan and Donovan, and some of the folkiness is like he's taking the piss. Pure whimsy. But this song's worth a listen. A grower.
It's Raining/The Darts. Didn't you love the Darts as a 13-year-old in the late 70s? I bought their first few singles, then got embarrassed by them and dropped them from my life. I remember this one of course, but not how lovely it is when you hear it now. I like a nice 50s pastiche, don't you? Super harmonies. One of their more serious ones, in the same vein as the wonderful Don't Let It Fade Away.
I Started A Joke/The Bee Gees. This band a like a pick and mix counter. There's a vast selection to choose from, but you don't like everything, so you just pop the ones you do like into your bag. And this is one of them. Not quite sure what it's all about, but I love the grand scale of it. Delusions of grandeur really. From their imperial period.
