samkydd

When old hits are used to great effect in a film or TV show and the hairs on the back of your neck rise it's a great feeling. One of my favourites of all time, and I don't know if it's ever been used in a film or TV show, is Petula Clark's hit from the early 1960s "Downtown" (written by Tony Hatch) and when I listen to it I find that it captures my perception of Swinging Sixties London perfectly.

It was an age I was too young to remember much about, and by the time I was old enough to go downtown for myself things had moved on and the bright lights and neon had become rather tacky and the music of the traffic in the city was just gridlock. The rhythm of a gentle bossa nova still sounds very appealing, as well some little places that never close (kebab takaways and police stations excluded). So whatever I manage to write that makes it to the box or screen, I've already decided that "Downtown" will be the theme tune.

When you're alone
And life is making you lonely,
You can always go downtown
When you've got worries,
All the noise and the hurry
Seems to help, I know, downtown

Just listen to the music of the traffic in the city
Linger on the sidewalk where the neon signs are pretty
How can you lose?

The lights are much brighter there
You can forget all your troubles, forget all your cares and go
Downtown, things'll be great when you're
Downtown, no finer place for sure
Downtown, everything's waiting for you

Don't hang around
And let your problems surround you
There are movie shows downtown
Maybe you know
Some little places to go to
Where they never close downtown

Just listen to the rhythm of a gentle bossanova
You'll be dancing with 'em too before the night is over
Happy again

The lights are much brighter there
You can forget all your troubles, forget all your cares and go
Downtown where all the lights are bright,
Downtown, waiting for you tonight
Downtown, you're gonna be alright now
(Downtown, downtown)

And you may find somebody kind to help and understand you
Someone who is just like you and needs a gentle hand to
Guide them alone

So, maybe I'll see you there
We can forget all our troubles, forget all our cares and go
Downtown, things'll be great when you're
Downtown, don't wait a minute more
Downtown, everything's waiting for you

"...the chairman of Littlewoods stores made a Keynote speech!"

Rob Compton

I agree, Sam, "Downtown" is a truly great song, and wonderfully performed by Pet Clark. It hasn't aged at all - and she has only aged a little bit!

rgds
Rob

DB7

I'll just add that I bought the Sigur Ros album last weekend, and tho it's Icelandic and I can't understand a word, it's quite wonderful.

As you were...

Billy Liar

Love 60's stuff like The Artwoods, Creation, Sorrows, David John & The Mood and other assorted beat/freakbeat groups. Nice to see a few punk fans around the place(good shout with Cock Sparrer) I'm into the Dead Kennedys, Black Flag, Cockney Rejects, Bad Brains, Pistols, Blitz, Buzzcocks etc.

Also love my Reggae music, anything on the Palma/Trojan lables from 1968/70(spanning the Skinhead era) usually hit's the spot. Nothing can beat The Skatalites though, fine, fine music.

Here's a few others I dig:-

Arcade Fire, Minor Threat, Lou Reed, Stooges, Joy Division, Slade, Mott The Hoople, Stone Roses, Death in Vegas, Wedding Pressent, I AM KLOOT, Elbow, Editors, Kaiser Chiefs, Kraftwerk, The Cure, Echo & The Bunnymen, The Who, Prince Buster, Derrick Morgan, Go-Team, Stupids, Northern/Motown Soul, old skool electro, I have thousands of records I could go on for years!

None of the above come close to The Smiths/Morrissey though.

EDIT: just noticed I'd already posted on this thread, I hit my 30's and it's all gone pair shape.

bloodworm

Please dont scoff but i am a country music fan and used to watch the dukes of hazard just to listen to the late great Waylon Jennings. the score for Walk the LIne is also worth a listen. I must also admit to watching Heartbeat purely to be reminded of some of the great songs i cherished in my youth. For a film score i would have to choose The Dambusters March written by Nottinghamshire born Eric coates....

C/U The Worm.

The one that gets away is always the biggest but not always the best !!

samkydd

I think some of the British war movie themes were terrific and I've still got a vinyl album from the 70s with all that stirring music; The Dambusters March, The Great Escape, Laurence of Arabia, 633 Squadron etc. When I was in the RAF the military bands we heard at various parades would invariably finish with a medley of such greats and it really stirred the emotions and got the adrenalin pumping. The Dambusters March should be our National Anthem and we'd all sing our hearts out instead of whispring the dour effort we have at the moment, and as someone pointed out in another thread the lyrics would be dead easy:

Nah, nah nah nah na-na nah
Nah, nah nah nah na-na nah ...............

"...the chairman of Littlewoods stores made a Keynote speech!"

Fellwanderer

Some of us studiously avoid it.

Well, at least that won't tax the vocabulary and intellect of [much of] the younger generation.

All the best
FELL

All the best
FELL

A signature is no substitute for a life

Billy Liar

Love the stuff Gillian Welch has put out over the last few years.

David Brent

Do you still BUY cd's DB7?

Have to agree with you about Sigur Ros. On the other hand though you have the Fins winning the Eurovision Song Contest with the biggest load of s**** I've seen in some time. Obviously the Europeans in general have no musical taste at all.
Dave.

Fellwanderer

Surely some mistake - "Eurovision Song contest" and "musical taste" almost in the same sentence!

All the best
FELL

All the best
FELL

A signature is no substitute for a life

samkydd

I think somehow there's a missing ingredient in old English culture, something so revolutionary it was wiped from the history books for fear of undermining the very structure of our society. This has to be the reason because when you think about it you've got the great music from Elgar, Vaughan Williams, Gilbert and Sullivan, then skipping swiftly past the Music Hall era (with anthems of the day like "Two Lovely Black Eyes" and "Champagne Charlie" you just have to), then on the mid-20th century Henry Hall and Ted Heath and the like, then the British innovative approach to rock and roll which took rock music to an unprecedented level of universal appeal, which petered out in the 80s when Casio's keyboard sales reached new heights (Howard Jones, Yazoo, OMD, Nik Kershaw, Pet Shop Boys etc) then on to the rinky-tink blandness of Lloyd Weber musicals, then boyband and girlie groups doing cissified covers of once great hits in an age where musical instruments were banned in favour of pretty faces and pansy people dance routines, in a musical style that made lift musak and ringtones sound interesting. And all the way through this musical revolution, the only English culture that existed and unfortunately is truly English is f***ing Morris Dancing!

Where the plain white outfits are as boring as the dancing, and the tinkling bells sound like a thousand disgruntled budgies throwing a wobbly in their cages and the whole thing is quite frankly rather disappointing. Somewhere along the line there was something fantastic going on and the government must have banned it and imposed the Morris Men on us!

"...the chairman of Littlewoods stores made a Keynote speech!"

Steve Crook

And don't forget the finger-in-the-ear folk music as well, as sung by people in thick wooly jumpers.
Mind you, that does tend to happen in the same real ale pubs where you also find Morris Dancing.
Maybe it's something in the beer?

Steve

samkydd

I used to go to folk clubs and festivals years ago and the only thing that put me off was when people would arrive late straight from work in their shiny company Vauxhall Cavaliers and have to go and change out of their pinstripe suits and into their folk uniform; baggy brown cords, waistcoat, a broad brown belt with things dangling off it, a leather cowboy hat, red bandana with white polka dots, a jumper that looked like it was made out of a hairy version of the Bayeaux Tapestry, and of course the battered metal tankard for that much needed pint of Olde Ditchwater real ale which was flatter than a girlfriend backing singer and as stomach churning as liquidising last night's leftover kebab and chips and downing it in one!

Some folk artists are very good and I remember the likes of Alex Glasgow, Harvey Andrews, The Albion Band, Sid Kipper etc but it was the crusty mud-caked medieval peasant role playing mob in the audience that used to put me off. The geography teachers growing their own herbs in their beards, and drinking parsnip and hedgehog spine wine, their womenfolk wearing discarded Laura Ashley curtains as skirts with huge white feet in rustic sandals made from the bark of sustainable trees and who parted company with their hairdresser years before resulting in a huge greying uncontrolable Gonk hairstyle with the texture of a brillo pad and dyed henna red, accentuated with a brightly painted wooden hairslide from a sustainable tribe in Namibia!

"...the chairman of Littlewoods stores made a Keynote speech!"

Marky B

I remember doing a cycling holiday in Cornwall,and we stopped over night in Wadebridge,having difficulty finding B&B because of a folk festival in the town. However,we did find a pub to stop over night and the next morning,we had set up our bikes ready for the off and a group of folk muisc lovers marched into the town,down the main street. I particularly remember the sight of one woman,with the smile of a simpleton,with the string of a drum around her neck,her face drenched with the rain (not a decent holiday for weather) descending into town with the others

I must stress that is not the view I have of folk music lovers now,in fact I don't mind a bit of it myself,but admittedly as a callow youth at the time (it was 1987),it did put me off the stuff.
Ta Ta
Marky B

I am special. The heavens always open for me.

Steve Crook

What a lovely picture you paint Sam. They are getting to be a bit endangered in most areas but I have seen them occasionally.

Steve