It was quite a thrill to be asked on to Desert Island Discs, a bit like getting a knighthood without the militaristic connotations. An endorsement if you will, a validation.. I've been a fan of 'Discs for quite some time, and the castaways are usually venerable politicians and esteemed writers, Nobel Prize Winners, former Secretary Generals of the UN, and captains of industry, basically some right top bananas. I'm guessing probably not many picked The Undertones. You can get my choices from the BBC website, but those 8 are the short list, I had to leave off quite a bit as you can imagine. Had to choose between Ever Fallen In Love and Teenage Kicks, the latter got the nod, only because I saw The Undertones at the Colston Hall and 'Desert is quite a personal journey through your life, and this was a vivid memory (if anyone was there, or can remember the year then let me know - would love to hear your thoughts on it). I seriously did want to be the Talking Heads keyboard player, and I will maybe try and shout that out at The Tom Tom Club gig at Meltdown next week..Would have loved to put in some of David Byrne's solo stuff also.. The King Curtis track, Memphis Soul Stew is a corker, and is about 7 minutes long, so they only had time to play the last 2 (instrumental minutes) but check out the whole track, because the best bit is at the beginning when King is introducing the band members one by one, as they start playing as 'ingredients' in the 'stew'...' a little pinch of Mississipi congeros' .. 'gimme 'bout a half a teacup..of bass!' - brilliant. We played a couple of Bowie covers in my first band, but Rebel made it in over Suffragette City, or Moonage Daydream. I was such a Pretenders fan, so that was a hard choice, Kid, Up the Neck, I Go to Sleep, Private Life, Message of Love, Back on the Chain Gang the list was going on..eventually went with Talk of the Town, great song and is typical of the sound, Chrissie Hynde's classic vocal and James Honeyman-Scott's jangling rich guitar sound -
don't get me started - I'll be here all day and the chameleons won't feed themselves..
hope to see you all at a large temporary marquee-type structure somewhere soon,
'Maybe tomorrow, maybe someday..'
b