The race is almost run

[mippy.livejournal.com]

OK, I've just had a claws-out argument with someone about The Days of Pearly Spencer. I love it, and told said person. "Mark Almond? Seriously? You are fucking weird. That's a terrible record. Mark Almond? This is some sick joke, right?' Then I was sent an mp3 of Peter Allen's I Go To Rio as my 'punishment', along with 'I played this AND Pearly Spencer on my student radio station as part of 'it's so bad, it's good...' 

I really love Pearly Spencer. I may have to re-evaluate my friendship in the light of this. But never mind that. I love MacArthur Park, because it's so over the top, it's wonderful. I love Pearly Spencer for much the same reasons - sheer melodrama - but sincerely; it's in the same category as ABC's All Of My Heart, PSB's It's A Sin, and some other records by acronym groups. I wouldn't go as far to say 'If you don't understand this record, you don't understand MOI!' and stomp off to my room to play my tapes, but really, it's not kitsch fodder, is it?

So, questions for discussion:

1. Which records can you genuinely not understand people disliking, somehow?
2. 'So bad it's good' - pop snobbism getting in the way of TEH TUNEZ?

Please write on both sides of the paper at once.

 

 

 

Comments

[carsmilesteve.livejournal.com]

dude "days of PS" is aces, as is most of that alBUM, although i think the version of jackie is my fave though.

♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ for marc almond though, i mean, who doesn't???

[mippy.livejournal.com]

"It's MARC not Mark!" But true. How can you not love someone who responded to a review of him as a 'preening leather-clad ninny' (I paraphrase) by turning up to said hapless scribe's office in full leatherman regalia brandishing a whip?

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Is this the same 'Pearly Spencer' as referred to on the ace nu Kompakt Total 7? By The Modernist?

It's probably my least fave on the compilation but even then it's not that bad...

[mippy.livejournal.com]

I don't know what this is but I may have to.

It's just not a 'so bad it's good' kinda record, really.

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Ah yes, I didn't get as far down as the rest of the post! There I go, commenting before I know what I'm on about. Anyway, see icon for best example ever.

[mippy.livejournal.com]

Each to their own :)

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

ha i noticed that Pearly Spencer ref on Total 7 and wondered this too.

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

According to werk, The Weathergirls did a cover of Pearly Spencer as well!

[mippy.livejournal.com]

Oh my good lord. My feeble, exhausted brain cannot even CONCIEVE of what that might sound like...

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I always find it RLY fascinating when a quite innocuous record attracts this kind of OMG YOU KITSCHSTER FULES ire.

On ILX recently I mentioned my liking of "Lean On Me" by Red Box and was accused of making some incomprehensible hipster taste-move! RED BOX!

Anyway I honestly can't imagine how people could dislike most of the canonical pop I like. I have a failure of imagination I think because clearly a lot of people do. I think it's more that I can't understand how people could see catchiness (say) as a bad thing.

I don't mind so bad its good really - it's a way into good after all. I prefer so bad it's OMG or so OMG its good, though.

[koganbot]

Fish see catchiness as a bad thing when catchiness is due to a hook.

[mippy.livejournal.com]

Time flies like an arrow - fruit flies like a banana.

[mippy.livejournal.com]

I only heard Lean on Me about three months ago, and it made me smile mightily. It still does.

[carsmilesteve.livejournal.com]

i think the level of "oh yeah, of COURSE you like girls aloud" comments i've had has started to decrease a bit, but is still prevalent...

Still Bill?

[(Anonymous)]

Hoping against hope that "Lean On Me" by Red Box is NOT the classic Bill Withers song?

[pink-weasel.livejournal.com]

I genuinely like all of Cliff Richard's records but I regularly encounter people who are too concerned with being cool to even consider listening to one. Their loss.

I'm slightly too embarassed to carry a Cliff Richard handbag though.

Cliff Richard handbag

[(Anonymous)]

You should carry a Cliff Richard handbag with his HEAD in it. It's what he deserves for making us suffer that appalling voice for so long.

Re: Cliff Richard handbag

[mippy.livejournal.com]

I don't even remember what the original post was about, but surely this is an act of treason and punishable by being locked in the Tower of London and death by a surfeit of malmsey?

[anatol-merklich.livejournal.com]

Actually this song may not be the best example for this *cough* theory, but still I THINK MAYBE:

For many people, including those Fond of Pop in General, songs that sound, or are, from a slightly, but not very, alien pop tradition can easily sound overkitsch. I'm reminded of the discussion after Tom's Popular entry on "Those Were the Days", where someone who absolutely hated it also hated "Seasons in the Sun". These songs have a quite identifiable national style, meaning among other things that they don't fit in very well with our expectation of what "pop" *should* sound like in our days *or*, possibly, when they came out. Still, they're not alien enough ("Kiss Kiss", "Mundian to bach ke") that they are seen as groundbreaking or exciting, or even properly exotic.

This song in particular is by an Irish folk/rock writer, though -- but with those swirly strings + Almond's cabaret/chanson stylings and history it may possibly hit the same spot with people?

[anatol-merklich.livejournal.com]

I like it v much by the way!

[(Anonymous)]

No. Malc Almond's cover versions appeal to people who are enamored with the "daring" excess of he and others like him, such as The Communards (who covered Harold Melvin & Bluenotes/Thelma Houston) etc. I blame the current popularity of so-called Gay "culture", ("Will & Grace" etc.) - used to reinforce the idea of some mythical gay "community" and "identity". This has simply raised the profile of those too dumb to create anything original and lasting.

P.S. I am gay, and find most entertainment popular on the Gay scene to be empty-headed tripe. We're not all mincing bimbos.

marc (cover version) almond

[(Anonymous)]

Why the hell are people even TALKING about Marc Almond, when all his pathetic cover versions pale into insignificance when compared to the original recordings?? Anyone with half an ear can recognise that the original versions of "Days of Pearly Spencer" and "Tainted Love" wipe the floor with that mincing pratt's efforts. That's all there is to it.