2011 Onwards: When my hair's all but gone and my memory fades

Once I reached my 50^th year, I succumbed to the scourge of senescence and gave up for good any attempt to keep up with the charts and note down the top four singles as I had done assiduously since 1973. Top of the Pops had long gone, barring the occasional one-off Steve Wright-narrated TOTP2 retrospectives, and I rarely listened to the radio.

Moving in with Angie in September 2012 made little difference to my exposure to contemporary music as we both eschewed the likes of digital networks such Capital or Kiss in favour of the Cardiff-based Nation Radio. Whilst rock-oriented, with a patriotic inclination towards the Manics, ‘Phonics and Catatonia, Nation does feature some new stuff, including ballads. However, ‘Urban’ genres such as hip-hop or grime and the pure teen pop of 1D and Little Mix are mercifully missing. 

However, the down side is that on the rare occasions when music appear on mainstream TV, I find myself tuning into my parents or grandparents by expressing my total ignorance of most artists. Take recent Brits nominees. Skepta. Huh? J-Hus. Who? Anohni? What? Dua Lipa? Is that just an anagram? Yet these are the Seals, Sinead O’Connors, Kate Bushes and the Bowies of modern times. And times change. It’s just that there comes a point when you suddenly realise that you no longer have to change with them. At least, not at the same rate.

The antipathy I feel towards much of ‘new’ music is very likely purely an age thing, and it helps drive me to the security blanket of nostalgia. My default listening has become oldies station Dragon Radio, the Greatest Hits CD or those ‘3 discs for a tenner’ compilations you buy at motorway service stations, play in the car and forever skip tracks until you find one you recognise. It’s usually Black Sabbath’s ‘Paranoid’ or Golden Earring’s ‘Radar Love’.

Yet it’s not all livin’ in the past. There remain songs which lodge in the memory, just as there always were. Some good, some dire. And there have been a fair few prompting me to reach for the sick bag. The Lumineers’ ‘Ho Hey’, James Bay’s ‘Hold Back the River’ and Wiz Khalifa’s repetitive ‘Black and Yellow’ spring readily to mind. One Direction and their subsequent solo stuff obviously weren’t intended to appeal to a 50-something, and neither was Rizzle Kicks’ ‘Do the Mama Hump’. Just as well! I can’t stand Mumford and Sons’ modern take on diddly-diddly Country and, despite the quality of ‘Take Me Home’, for some reason I can’t get on with Jess Glynne’s voice.

In 2011, Jessie J promised much. A British pretender to the throne of Gaga, Perry and Pink, she and her fierce fringe delivered the dubious ‘Do It Like a Dude’, followed by the altogether more inclusive slow-beat hip-hop of ‘Price Tag’. I’m not totally convinced that she was in the business purely “to make the world dance”; her ship jumping from The Voice UK to the more lucrative X Factor certainly stank of bling and ker-ching!

Lana Del Ray’s Gothic melodrama of ‘Born to Die’ was another in my credit column, while Christine Perri’s ‘Jar of Hearts’ also turned melancholy and heartache into a successful single. Lorde’s stripped back ‘Royals’ sounded very different, and Gotye’s genre-defying million-seller ‘Somebody That I Used to Know’ enjoyed mass appeal despite being impossible to dance to.

2012 was the year of Diamond Jubilees and the London Olympics. Both sought to capitalise on British musical pedigree with multi-artist performances. The gig outside Buckingham Palace was fairly forgettable but the Olympic Closing Ceremony spared no superstar on the bill. Yet for all the much-lauded appearances of The Spice Girls, The Who, McCartney and an underwhelming George Michael, the artist I still associate with the Stratford stadium event is Emeli Sande. Amidst all the Olympics tracks flooding the charts in August, it was her breathtaking rendition of ‘Read All About It' which lingers more vividly.

Like London mayor Boris Johnson - but without the hypocrisy - Sande peaked at the perfect time to reap the rewards of a billion-plus global audience, tuned in already a-glow with the heat generated by a hugely heart-warming fortnight of sport. Her album Our Version of Events was the biggest selling in UK for 2012 and the second-biggest the following year. Her duet with Labrinth, ‘Beneath Your Beautiful’ (that’s the official spelling, not a typo) was another triumph but, for all her 2016 comeback ballyhoo and consequent Brit award, I fear she left it too late to carry that public love into the second half of the decade.

The other insurmountable barrier is that she isn’t Adele.

I must confess that when Adele released the first single of her album 21 it left me underwhelmed. ‘Rolling in the Deep’ was a change from her ballads but its upbeat gospelly sound wasn’t really up my alley and it peaked at two. However, in the States it made her a massive star, selling squillions. What transformed Ms Adkins into a UK icon was her heart-melting performance of ‘Someone Like You’, accompanied only by a piano, at the O2 Brits ceremony in 2011.

I didn’t watch the broadcast. However, there couldn’t be anyone who hasn’t seen it since who wasn’t utterly, utterly captivated by the delivery and genuine tears shed by Adele at the end. The single promptly rocketed from 46 to 1 in the chart, becoming the biggest seller of the year and exploding the album into record-breaking territory. Even I felt a lump in my throat.

I also loved the piano intro and verse to ‘Set Fire to the Rain’ although it failed to make the top ten here. Meanwhile, the Yanks couldn’t get enough of her. What won me over was her concert from the Royal Albert Hall. Her folksy ord’nary-girl-from-London charisma and natural interaction with friends and mates in the audience were nothing like anything I’d seen from a major artist. In a local pub perhaps, but not an illustrious venue like the Albert Hall! Her emotional, sometimes potty-mouthed, links between songs demonstrated why so many people can relate to her and the way she channelled life experiences into music. I dare you to listen to her introduction to ‘Someone Like You’ and not be spellbound. And she sure knows how to ‘phrase’ those lyrics, too, probably her greatest asset when singing live or on record.

Since those heady days of 2011, Adele’s blazing success has been undimmed. It’s a relief, too, that she hasn’t been forced to conform to the traditional Hollywood Size Zero stereotype. I’m not a huge fan of her music; the sequence of impassioned, poignant ballads is becoming a bit tedious, too one-paced for me. Nevertheless she remains a beacon of homegrown talent and has more X Factor than any act churned out of Simon Cowell’s assembly line. 

It hasn’t just been soul giants like Adele or teen fodder like Shawn Mendes releasing ballads. Even Will.I.Am and Fergie showed their sensitive sides on ‘Just Can’t Get Enough’ I’m not sure whether it counts as a ballad but Coldplay’s ‘Paradise’ has burrowed deep into my musical psyche more than any other in recent years. On first hearing it sounded a bit old-fashioned, maybe a bit over-produced. It was seeing the video following a man dressed as a joke elephant escaping London Zoo, taking the Tube to Heathrow, then flying to Africa to meet up his family on the plains which made me fall in love with the record. And Chris Martin as unicyclist. Who knew?! It took a while to reach the summit of the singles chart, just after Christmas 2011, but I still love the dramatic synth chords, the inevitable “wooh-oo-wooh”s, seductive string sections and that triumphant chorus and guitar solo. Those ingredients which at first seemed to make an unappetising stew, now combine to serve up a 21^st century gourmet classic.

As must be apparent, I do have a high regard for melodic synth pop. Since the heyday of Depeche Mode, Human League et al, it has been in relatively short supply so when something breaks through the twenty-first century genre barrier, I raise a brave cheer or three. La Roux did it in 2009 then in 2015 it was the turn of Years and Years. They also topped the chart briefly with the excellent ‘King’. I adore the Mediterranean flute-like motif running through the track, which bounds along beautifully throughout.

When it comes to ubiquity in the last few years, few can match Pharrell Williams. Already in his forties, the former ‘Neptune’ and media all-rounder wrote, produced and sang lead vocals on no fewer than three million-selling singles in under two years. Not even Lennon or McCartney in their heyday could claim such an achievement. The first was the toe-tapper ‘Get Lucky’ the second the toe-curler ‘Blurred Lines’. ‘Get Lucky’ was officially a Daft Punk record but it’s Pharrell’s falsetto and in particular Nile Rodgers’ Chic-ish disco guitar which appealed to me and a legion of downloaders and streamers. Even I could have a go at dad-dancing to this at a family wedding. On the other hand, the collaboration with Robin Thicke on ‘Blurred Lines’ was a different kettle of (rotten) fish and, while undeniably catchy, Williams' ‘Happy’ - one of the very short list of singles shifting more than 2 million in the UK - makes me rather less than happy; irritated, not happy.

Up to 2012, if I had told anyone I’d like anything by an outfit called Swedish House Mafia they would be at liberty to refer me to mental health services. Failing that, to shoot me! I was unfamiliar with the electro trio’s earlier stuff but they finally registered with me thanks to ‘Don’t You Worry Child’. I know I’m probably in a minority here but I love the production, building from the understated opening guitar riff through John Martin’s wistful verse to the anthemic chorus.

By way of contrast, some of my musical exposure in recent years has been influenced by the arrival in my life of Angie’s grand-daughter Millee-Rae. Always a chatty soul, I’d no inkling of her affection for pop music until, at the age of two, she started singing along during a car journey to Angie’s Sam Smith CD. But, Millee, why did you have to choose the execrable ‘Stay With Me’? I can’t abide Smith’s white soul-boy songs. Yes, he has a super smooth tenor voice but that high-pitched whine sounds so depressing.

As for Millee, her affections transferred to Meghan Trainor’s ‘All About the Bass, ‘Let It Go’ from the Disney blockbuster Frozen, Pink's 'What About Us?' and Sia’s ‘Cheap Thrills’. Maybe our Millmeister is developing some good taste as she matures, because I quite like it, too. Uncomplicated pure pop with the now-commonplace Latin chonk-a-chonk-chonk beat, aligned with Sean Paul’s ‘featured’ but totally unnecessary vocals, it’s a song that can do no wrong. It’s hard to stop myself from joining in with the verse:- 

Gotta do my hair, put my make up on
It's Friday night and I won't be long

Til I hit the dance floor
Hit the dance floor

   

But stop I must….

The veteran Aussie singer is leading the way for the females but it’s the men who have come to the fore in recent years. Casting aside the likes of 1D and Justin Bieber – preferably over a steep cliff into shark-infested waters – a raft of male singer-songwriters has emerged to critical and market acclaim.

In 2013, in addition to the aforementioned Sam Smith and established figures like Gary Barlow and John Legend, along came Yorkshire’s John Newman (‘Love Me Again’), Chichester’s Tom Odell and fellow South Coaster Michael Rosenberg, aka Passenger. Personally I can’t stand the latter’s million-selling ‘Let Her Go’; that weedy voice goes through me like a senna enema. However, I could warm to Odell’s ‘Another Love’, even though I do feel sympathy for his piano, which receives a fearful pounding during every performance.  

A handful of outstanding baritones have also arrived on the scene. First of all, George Ezra’s cute, kooky modern folk song ‘Budapest’ deservedly went to three in the chart early in 2014. Apparently 20 year-old George had never been to the Hungarian capital but it’s a captivatingly diverting ditty delivered in a distinctive mature vocal. Ezra supported Irish singer-songwriter Hozier on his 2015 tour, a musical match made in heaven. Andrew Hozier-Byrne also made his name the previous year, thanks to the extraordinary ‘Take Me to Church’. It’s a no-holds-barred attack on the Catholic church’s antagonistic attitude towards homosexuality. With lyrics such as:-

“I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies
I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife”

it’s hardly a fun-packed four minutes, but it’s emotional stuff. Musically it’s all dramatic thunderous minor chords, suggesting the imminent arrival of the Grim Reaper rather than a global pop success. It wasn’t a number one single but only two outsold it in the UK throughout 2015, and sold millions in the States.

When in 2017 I first heard the opening bars of Rag ‘n’ Bone Man’s ‘Human’, I assumed I was hearing another Hozier gut-wrencher. I don’t suppose I was alone to be surprised at seeing the actual artist for the first time, his generous bulk and menacing beard belonging to an intimidating club bouncer or Hell’s Angel rather than a pop star. The ghostly yelps and cries backing the opening verse evoke the sound of a night in a zoo rather than a recording studio but it’s a cool, chilling and utterly compelling record.

‘Rag’, or Rory, as his Mum would no doubt call him, was kept off the top of the singles chart by the man who in the past five years has enjoyed a career trajectory most musicians can only dream about. A man who has achieved phenomenal things despite a personal attribute normally such a barrier to star status: ginger hair! I’m talking, of course, about Ed Sheeran.

In the summer of 2011, Ed’s soft yet shiny voice was always on the airwaves. On ‘A Team’, it seemed incongruously light and upbeat whilst telling the dark story of a young woman, apparently stuck in a rut of crack addiction and prostitution, gently issuing descriptive lyrics such as:-

“But lately her face seems
Slowly sinking, wasting
Crumbling like pastries”

It clearly wasn’t written as a hard-hitting and worthy ‘song with a message’, but the subtle use of melody and easily flowing production allow the song to be enjoyed first, then work as social observation. For all Ed’s subsequent work, I think his appeal is encapsulated in this debut hit.

I first saw him on telly, performing ‘A Team’ in the BBC ‘garden’ at Glastonbury that June. Accompanied only by his urgently-strummed acoustic guitar, his green polo shirt, jeans, wellies and band-bedecked wrists signified an ordinary bloke who would probably next be seen with an open guitar case at his feet in a London Underground tunnel or provincial shopping centre. An ordinary bloke, but with extraordinary talent.

I was given a CD of his first album +, which contained further atmospheric observational everyman folky ballads like ‘Lego House’ and ‘Small Bump’. but was no guarantee that such an affable, haystack-haired lad raised in rural Suffolk would become a global phenomenon and sex god. ‘Ginger hair’ and ‘sex god’ are not terms normally found in the same sentence. I should know!. It was an ultimate airy love song, ‘Thinking Out Loud’, from 'X', which cemented his position in the hearts of Brits, Yanks and music fans across the world. Like Ed himself, this was no overnight sensation either; it took 19 weeks from initial streaming release to taking its rightful place at the top of the chart and as part of our wedding dance!

Sheeran’s very ordinariness and antithesis of the standard blueprint of  music celebrity are what make him so popular with people of all ages, genders and classes. I cannot condone his declarations of love for drugs and alcohol; instead I want to love Ed for his genre-bending music and cute scruffiness, for emanating from East Anglia, beat-up brown acoustic in hand, for his unapologetic redheadedness in a world of fake blondes and fake tan. 

Moving on to 2017 and the long-awaited third album ÷ (Divide), transcended everything which had gone before. Not only did the 12-track record sell 672,000 in its first week, beaten only by Adele’s 25 and Oasis’ Be Here Now, but the release for streaming of all these tracks and four others led on 10^th March to an unprecedented domination of the singles chart by one artist. With nine of the top ten places and sixteen of the top 20, Sheeran has single-handedly destroyed the whole concept of the venerable chart as a reliable guide to what people are buying; largely because the concept of ‘buying’ itself has become total blurred.

The medium of music streaming has rendered the old format of releasing ‘singles’ totally obsolete, and now the conflict between the notions of ‘listening’ and ‘engaging’ has been raised. What should The Chart be for? For a number of years it has tried to keep up with technology by incorporating shop purchases (now very few), online downloads and streaming but it is the latter which has tipped the balance, presumably forever. It’s all crystallised in the Sheeran Supremacy of March 2017. Thanks, Ed. For nothing.

And yet this current phenomenon permits peripheral contemporary pop fans like me the potential to sample new music with just a few taps on a keyboard, pausing to try another track if I can’t ‘engage’ with the first. I have done so with ÷, thus discovering that Sheeran has perhaps over-reached himself in the peculiar rush to cover as wide a range of genres as possible on one record. As well as the seductive ‘Shape of You’ (those Latin rhythms again) and nostalgic yearning for childhood and Framlingham ‘Castle on the Hill’ (sounding like a panting Labrador racing across the fields), there’s Irish folk, Spanish fiesta, Hip-Hop, R‘n’B and, of course, a selection of more typical wistful romantic ballads.

I’d love to see Ed Sheeran or Coldplay live. However, without the right apps, motivation to ring a box office number or focus non-stop on the appropriate website, that will remain a pie-in-the-sky pipedream. Stadium tours by such big guns are, of course, not an everyday occurrence. Visiting anywhere within 100 miles of home is even rarer. Thus perusal of What’s On pages instead tends to lead my eyes towards the plethora of tribute acts or nostalgic Sixties, Seventies or Eighties concerts.

Angie and I have actually taken the plunge and bought a few tickets, albeit with mixed results. I feel privileged to have seen two of the most famous tribute bands: Bjorn Again and The Bootleg Beatles. By the time we saw the latter, on 9^th December 2012 at the St David’s Hall, Cardiff, the fake Fab Four had been active for 32 years, a career three times as long as the originals had mustered. The music is timeless (even 'Love Me Do'), of course, but the Bootlegs' all-round musicianship was also excellent, backed by a mini-orchestra for the Sergeant Pepper era segment.

They appear at the Hall every winter, as does the collective known as The Classic Rock Show. We went along in 2013 and it was another extremely enjoyable experience, this time witnessed from the stalls. The essence of the act was to reproduce faithful note-for-note a few dozen songs from the archives. Basically, anything involving legendary guitar solos (or duos) was on the setlist, from Fleetwood Mac’s ‘The Chain’ to a climactic ‘Won’t Get Fooled Again’, If there can be any criticism, it was that it was almost too perfect. 

In 2015, I was determined to experience some more live music here in Cardiff. Finding something which appealed to both of us was far from simple. However, Simple Minds and Paul Weller were each in town so I struck while the iron (and debit card) was hot. Sadly we didn’t get to see the former as Mum passed away two days earlier. The notion of enjoying a live gig in such circumstances was absurd, unthinkable. We did manage to attend Paul Weller’s performance at the Motorpoint Arena. Fortunately for me, but not for Angie, for whom the old Modmeister’s insistence on playing unfamiliar solo stuff, especially his new album tracks was met with at best indifference. At least we could all boogie down to ‘A Town Called Malice’, the show’s crowning glory and finale.

In June 2016, it was the turn of Rod Stewart. Angie’s choice, of course, but I could at least appreciate the opportunity of seeing and hearing one of the legends of my lifetime growling out his hits. His knighthood had just been announced and, while Sir Rod may not have been as good as he used to be (whaddya expect? He was 72!), his charisma was undimmed and showmanship what we expected from a man with fifty years in the business. A great night was had under the Cardiff stars.

That November, we enjoyed another shameless excursion into our past by seeing The Human League, again at the St David’s. Not quite a sell-out, but there were plenty of like-minded people my age taking their seats eager to re-live their youth in the company of Phil, Susanne and Joanne. Once we became accustomed to the sight of Mr Oakey shaven-headed, we could comfortably wallow in synth-laden nostalgia as he impressively ran through Eighties classics like 'Human', 'Louise', 'Love Action' and 'Don’t You Want Me'. Next month, local faves Stereophonics lay in wait for us.

Sadly, live music doesn’t feature strongly in my life. I missed out on the gig-going rite of passage that all teens and twenty-somethings are supposed to have undergone. I can’t claim to have seen the emergence of future stars in some London sidestreet bar, nor any epoch-defining stadium event, and it’s far too late now. Yes, there were the string of West End musicals in my Rotaract days and village hall board-treading with the QMTC, but they bore no relation to the pop and rock music closest to my heart.

And so I have to relive those heady days through the medium of CD (from Angie’s Cat Stevens and Whitney to my BritPop and New Romantics and our shared affection for Abba, Bowie and Carpenters), car radio and YouTube.  And yet, as I wrote at the very start, nostalgia still ain’t what it used to be; Nation Radio has subtly altered its strapline to ‘Nineties, Noughties and Now’, with the result that the ‘Now’ has moved more to the fore, straying into Capital territory. And not for the better. Never has my own archive delving been more heart-achingly vital but never has it been so indicative of my own inevitable ageing process. 56 isn’t old! I’m the same age as Suggs, Roland Gift, Boy George, The Edge, Daniel O’Donnell… Hang on, that last one makes me feel really old!

As has been a recurring theme of this trip down memory lane, music can spark memories of all sorts of things; places, events, random moments in my life. It can also be used with the sole intention of remembering people. In 2015, Catherine and I were dealt the double blow of losing Mum and Dad within six months of each other. Amidst all the maelstrom of emotions and physical pressures of clearing two lifetimes of possessions and the complexities of probate, we could at least find an island of sanity and pleasure of sorts in deciding what music to include at their respective funeral services.

It’s not just the sad occasions which require music to evoke, reflect or inspire. For our wedding, Angie and I seemed to devote more hours ruminating over our choice of music for the ceremony than the perennial problem of the guest list and table plan! While a cock-up meant not all were played, the following five made the cut:-

·       A Million Love Songs (Take That)

·       Something’s Gotten Hold of My Heart (Marc Almond and Gene Pitney)

·       Wonderwall (Oasis)

·       Love is All Around (Wet Wet Wet)

·       My Baby Just Cares For Me (Nina Simone)

And then there’s the dilemma of The First Dance. I’d been worrying interminably about this. It’s probably why I’ve never married before. All I knew was that there would be none of that elaborately choreographed mix-tape nonsense so beloved of YouTubers these days. We settled for a segue from the predictable ‘Talking Out Loud’ to the rather less obvious ‘Wild Thing’. Plenty of potential for embarrassment and humiliation but hopefully slow enough to avoid the need for oxygen or a trip to Casualty. It seemed to go down well!

So, from Stewpot and Savile to St David’s and DJ Kevin, there’s always been music in my life. Engagement takes many forms. Whether I’ve been ‘twisting’ to Chris Montez, drumming with knitting needles to Herman’s Hermits, contributing to four-part harmonies on stage with the QMTC, playing air guitar to Deep Purple, taping the best bits of the Top 30 or boogying on down at my own wedding, it’s almost ever-present across the decades.

My tastes have been influenced by many sources. Of all the stunning stuff I’ve detailed, there’s no golden thread linking them all. Just what is it which has led me to single out so many brilliant recordings? Occasionally a record registers as a perfect package from first note to last. Kate Bush’s ‘The Man with the Child in His Eyes’ is one such song which gives me a sense of completeness. On the other hand, I never want Massive Attack’s ‘Unfinished Sympathy’ to end.  Some of it is feel-good fun (e.g. REM’s ‘Shiny Happy People’), some of it is feel-bad melancholia (e.g. The Smith’s ‘How Soon is Now?’). I have warmed to the humour of ‘Baggy Trousers’, intelligence of 10cc, gone moist-eyed listening to the bittersweet lyrics of Gilbert O’Sullivan’s ‘Alone Again (Naturally)’, jumped to the beat of ‘Love Shack’ and had my mind blown by ‘Bohemian Rhapsody’. 

Music gets me in the gut for all sorts of reasons, making its move throughout my life. Stevie Wonder once said:-

                     “Music, at its essence, is what gives us memories.

                      And the longer a song has existed in our lives,

                      the more memories we have of it.” 

I tend to agree.  The hits from my childhood do indeed hold a particularly tight grip on my memory banks. Whatever life throws at me, I’m sure music will remain an inspiration, a motivation, a diversion, a comfort blanket.  

Reminiscing whilst writing this diary has been not only a thoroughly enjoyable, nostalgic experience but also an educational one. I’ve learned a lot about the artists and hits I’ve both loved and loathed. I also appreciate that the year-by-year diary doesn’t necessarily allow me to tell the whole story. . What are the songs which best provide the timeline to my existence? Which are my actual favourites? Whose are the voices which make my hairs stand on end? Watch this space...