Ultimate dad
Marcus Berkmann
A wonderful letter in this month's Moja,
Inc magazine for gnarled old rockers (and rollers). It refers to a booklet that came free with the previous month's issue and purported to list songs for an Ultimate Jukebox, should we ever find such a thing in the Ultimate Pub, just up the road from Ultima Thule. Needless to say I had long since lost the booklet, having probably thrown it away with all the ad pullouts for Eric Clapton boxsets without which an edition of Mob o would not be complete. But Mr Toby Messer of Barnes, London SW studied the booklet more closely, and felt inspired to write to the magazine about it. 'By and large your Ultimate Jukebox was absolutely bang on,' he raves. 'But ELO's "Mr Blue Sky"? Please? Are you having a laugh? Ultimate dad's record.'
Oh dear.
Not that I have anything against dads as such. By strange circumstance I happen to be one myself.
But even so.
As it happens, there exists a sub-genre of popular music known widely and informally as `dadrock'. It's a term designed to belittle the works of middle-aged artists like Paul Weller who remain in thrall to the blues-based rock of the late 1960s and the early 1970s. As I have always hated this sort of music I have never felt remotely threatened by the word. Indeed, I may have used it once or twice or 400 times myself when taunting friends who cannot accept that music may have moved on a bit since Jimi Hendrix and Led bloody Zeppelin. (Men in their forties argue just as forcefully about their musical tastes as they did in their twenties. The only difference is that they now have wives and children to tell them to shut up.) But 'Mr Blue Sky', which I played at savage volume only last weekend? That's below the belt. If it's the ultimate dad's record, then I must be the ultimate dad. Cardigans. loose teeth and a nostalgic yearning for Branston pickle must surely follow. Soon I'll sit slumped in my armchair all day, asking everyone who passes whether Frank Bough is still presenting Nationwide. 'Ultimate dad's record.' I always thought that was 'Hi Ho Silver Lining' by Jeff Beck. But that's so old it must now be the ultimate grandad's record. A doctor friend tells me that it's the latest test for Alzheimer's. You put it on and if they hum along they've got it. Everybody else would he far too embarrassed.
Who, at the crunch, does not prefer the records of their youth? If I were ever on Desert Island Discs, six or seven of my choices would be pop tunes from the golden era of 1975 to 1979. (That's my golden era. What's yours?) My friend George buys vast numbers of new CDs, all of them jangling and clanging and crunching with loud guitars, but his eyes still mist over at the mere mention of the Buzzcocks"Spiral Scratch' EP. let alone its opening chords. He and I are both 42.
Which may also explain why so many people of our age like the albums by Air and Goldfrapp and Zero 7 and now Lemon Jelly, as they are all crammed full of tunes (as 1970s pop was). And why we like Turin Brakes, who sound more and more like Pink Floyd with every album. And The Strokes and The White Stripes and all the other guitar bands of the moment, who are producing young person's versions of old person's music. Some of us even went out and bought the first album by the Mull Historical Society, because all the reviews said it sounded like ELO. (It didn't. so we don't play that one much anymore.) In fact, pretty much every new record of merit is dadrock of a sort, or dadpop. or dad-dance, or grandad-country, or greatgrandad-folk. (Or mumrock. Let's not be gender-specific about this.) What differentiates 'Mr Blue Sky' from the other songs on the Ultimate Jukebox is that it was, and remains, blindingly uncool. In other words Toby is taking the piss out of me (without specifically aiming to) just as I would take the piss out of anyone whose musical tastes were palpably less cool than mine. At the age of 42 you would hope to have grown beyond that. But then there are a few ridiculous things I don't seem to have grown out of. 'Hey there Mr Blue/we're so pleased to be with you ...
Previous page
