A LIFE AT 45RPM

I'm a music lover. In fact, passionate or obsessive might be a better description for how important music has been and still is to me. I have followed myriad musical artists with the same religious zeal that most men might follow a football team. It all began when i was very young, 4 or 5. My Dad had quite a large collection of 7" singles - with a few of my Mums mixed in - and whilst he was at work my Mum would often play them. Most of it was Glam Rock from the early seventies - Mud, Suzi Quatro, Sweet, Slade etc - an quite a few by Status Quo, plus a pick'n'mix of Pop hits, Motown, and a few more recent New Wave selections by Squeeze, Elvis Costello, Adam & The Ants, and the band who i would later become a huge fan of: Madness. There were a few albums too, mainly the K-Tel Various Artists compliations of the day bearing names like Disco Fever, Night Moves, and Power Hits. These cheap tv-advertised albums were the forerunner to the hugely successful NOW That's What I Call Music series, and my parents would often put them on if we had birthday parties. I lapped all this up from a young age, with no idea of who the performers of these songs were or any notion that this music was largely from before my birth: i just knew i liked it. Even as i grew up and became more aware of the charts and Top Of The Pops i would still listen to these songs from another era, often to much piss taking from my school mates. At junior school we would have a weekly assembly put on by Mr Hogg - much younger and cooler than the other teachers - where the kids would be invited to put on short plays, sing or play an instrument, or - joy of joys - bring in records to play. Always singles. I was well aware of the music currently in the charts: Madonna, A-ha, Duran Duran, etc. But i would often turn up with 7"s from my parents collection. The nostalgia market wasn't a thing yet, and the internet didn't exist, so the notion of all the music that's ever been made being available was nearly two decades away. The idea that younger people could appreciate music from bygone eras was laughable. But i didn't care, and when my parents bought a new Hi-Fi system for the living room in 1986 i was given my Dads 1970s turntable for my room, along with the collection of 45's. That Christmas i was also given a small radio/cassette recorder and a stack of blank cassettes, and Sunday night would be spent in my room recording the Top 40. So it was at the age of 10 - and less than a year away from turning 11 - that my love for music went up several notches. The radio opened up my ears to a world beyond the music i'd been enveloped in, and i would often sneak out of bed at night, plug my headphones in, and listen to whatever station i could get a decent reception on. Suddenly, listening to older records wasn't enough: i needed to begin my own collection. I would have to wait a few more months yet; until then. recording songs off the radio would have to suffice. Being able to do this in my bedroom meant that i could lose myself in the music without interruption. In those first few months of 1987, i would excitedly wait to hear my favourite songs of the moment, and back then my tastes were unashamedly POP. The new bands of the time are now mocked for being bland and soulless, but at the time the likes of Curiosity Killed The Cat, Wet Wet Wet, Living In A Box and Hue & Cry were part of a new wave of "Sophisti-pop" acts, blending soul, jazz and funk with pop nous, admittedly with the rough edges sanded off. Songs like CKTC's "Down To Earth" and "Misfit" are shiny, lightweight and disposable, and therefore perfectly aimed at kids and young teens. Out of the four acts i mentioned above, i can only listen seriously to Hue & Cry these days, but they were always a more grown up and literate proposition, more political and adult in their lyrics and sophisticated in their music. They were also less successful as a singles act, although the one hit they had in 87 - the funky and Thatcher-criticising "Labour Of Love" is still a classic pop song and remains one of my favourites.

BBC FOUR have been showing re-runs of Top Of The Pops for the last few years, starting from 1978 onwards and working their way through the years (whilst editing out now disgraced presenters and even missing entire episodes), and i have been avidly watching them. This has jogged the old memory and sparked a touch of nostalgia in me, even alerting me to music that slipped past me at the time. I've already got another music blog, but this one is going to be solely about the humble 45, the 7", the single. Singles are what shaped the tastes of most music fans for years, especially in the younger years as they are more affordable for those with pocket money or a newspaper round. The idea of the single has undergone significant changes in recent years, with physical releases almost dropping off the map in favour of downloaded files and streaming so that teenagers today don't even own the music they love in any tangible way. There are still limited 7" releases - almost exclusively independent acts and labels - but it is precarious. This blog is celebration of a format which, in spite of its disposable nature, has imprinted itself on the national consciousness. I will be writing about the singles that influenced my tastes, the records i bought and the ones i wished i had, vinyl lost and found, the changing nature of the format, and the valiant attempts of the few to keep this once essential part of the musical landscape alive. I hope anyone who reads this will enjoy and comment.