45 YEARS OF 45's pt.1

 I've begun the long process of compiling my 45 favourite 45's, a task i've set myself to a) keep my mind active during the current and no doubt lengthy lockdown and b) to see if i can actually do it - whittle down 40 years of listening to, obsessing over, of buying and collecting music. I say "music" rather than records , because a large amount of the music i've bought has been on CD, the vinyl era being in its decline by the time i left school and started working. Most of the vinyl i bought was on 7" throughout my teens, both then-current releases and old records from flea markets, second-hand shops and such. And in recent years i began collecting vinyl again, mostly albums but also singles, often re-buying the 45's i had in my youth. 

Going through the music that has soundtracked my life so far is like a mental spring clean: dusting off old memories, putting lost thoughts and ideas in order, clearing out the detritus. As far as the music goes, i'm remembering and re-listening to songs i haven't played in years, working out which ones i still love, that i still get that thrill from, that neck hair raising, heart rushing "wow" factor. As we get older our memories sometimes fool us, we remember things differently, and certainly in the minds of those who are passionate about music we kid ourselves that we were much "cooler" than perhaps we actually were: that we didn't buy mere "pop" records, but were into whatever was hip at the time. I make no such claims: although The Stone Roses' eponymous debut album was and is critically acclaimed and widely considered to be an essential part of any serious music lovers collection, it barely scraped into the top twenty on its initial release, so it follows that not many actually bought it. I didn't succumb to its charms until about five years ago, although i've liked a few tracks from it for longer than that. And whilst i now appreciate the ground-breaking hip-hop and rap that came out of the late eighties - Public Enemy and so on - it didn't speak to me at the time. So my list of 45's will be entirely honest: no attempt at censoring songs that will be considered naff or cheesy, if it still means a lot to me it will be in there. 

As part of this project, i will be tracking down any single in my initial list on 7". I've already bought several from Discogs, and have more lined up. I have limits though: a more recent release was only given a limited vinyl run, and only in Australia, so as much as i love this song £35 is a bit steep! If i find it at a more reasonable price it might make the cut. 

45 YEARS OF 45's..........

I grew up on 7" singles. 45's. Singles - be they on vinyl, cassette, cd, or a downloadable file - streaming doesn't count in my eyes - are the entry level point for any fan of music. Hearing or even taping songs from the radio gives you a glimpse into that world, but the act of buying a single opens the door: you've paid for it, it now belongs to you. Many a musical artist has said that once they put music out into the world, it belongs to the fans, to the people who buy it. Having to leave the house and make that journey to a record shop, browse the racks, make your choice and pay for it - nothing beats that feeling, even now. During the pandemic such opportunities have been scarce, and whilst you can order online it feels...... incomplete, impersonal. I look forward to those times again. 

Anyway, i turn 45 later this year. I've been aware of, enjoying, and actively listening to music for at least 40 of those years. I've been buying music for 33 years (my first records were birthday and Christmas presents, plus the odd single i'd pestered my parents into buying for me), and even after i graduated to albums i still felt the pull of the 45, right through the heyday of the cd single and into the iTunes era. Right into the early noughties i had hundreds of cd singles, which i compiled on minidiscs and flogged at a carboot sale when storage space became an issue. Whenever i hear a new track on the radio, or see the music video on YouTube, i feel a pang of sadness that it won't see a physical release. I realise that this is how things are done now, that it's probably more environmentally friendly to not have pressing plants churning out millions of plastic discs that, whilst recyclable, will largely end up discarded, like the ribbons of magnetic tape that littered the countryside in the 1980's, probably hurled out a car window following a marital argument or by a TWOC'er. The demise of the single (in any meaningful sense) has only increased my nostalgic love of the format, and probably a middle-aged yearning for the simpler days of my youth. So i've decided to mark my 45th year by compiling my 45 favourite.... 45's. I've made - or attempted to make -  various lists over the years, compilations of my favourite singles or songs, some in a chart format and some chronologically, and i always struggle to finish them. Because there are just TOO MANY. With that in mind, i'm imposing some rules on myself: 1 - all songs must have been available as a 7" single. 2 - only singles released from the date of my birth 2nd August 1976 onwards will count. 3 - in the interests of keeping it simple, only one track per single: the A-side or AA if it's a double A-side, or lead track if it's an EP. This does mean whole swathes of songs that i love but were released before i was born won't be eligible, as will much released in the last 20 years. But this isn't about songs, it's about that humble 7" piece of vinyl that requires the listener to really engage with it,  by the physical acts required to obtain it, and to play it to hear the magic contained within its grooves. I already know some of the songs that will make the list, but the tricky part will be whittling down the rest to just 45. Wish me luck!