Sunday 27 October 2013

Morrissey, Autobiography: The Music







Here are all of the name-dropped songs and singles that furnish Morrissey’s Autobiography (excluding his own, of course) compiled as a playlist with all that Spotify will allow. Warning: it’s (predictably) quite brilliant…Here is the Spotify link: Morrissey: Autobiography playlist and the track listing is below. Treat yourself to my review of the Autobiography here

Track listing:


Millie – My Boy Lollipop
Roy Orbison – It's Over
Manfred Mann – Pretty Flamingo
New Vaudeville Band – Peek A Boo
Four Tops – Bernadette
Paul Jones – I've Been A Bad Bad Boy
Francoise Hardy – All Over The World - English Version of "Dans Le Monde Entier"
The Righteous Brothers – You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin' - Single Version
Jimmy Jones – Good Timin'
Tony Orlando – Bless You
Marianne Faithfull – Come And Stay With Me
Love Affair – Rainbow Valley
The Foundations – Back On My Feet Again
Small Faces – Lazy Sunday
Sandie Shaw – You've Not Changed
Lulu – I'm a Tiger
Rita Pavone – Heart
Diana Ross & The Supremes – Reflections - Single Version
Diana Ross & The Supremes – I'm Livin' In Shame - Juke Box Single Version (Stereo)
Matt Monro – We're Gonna Change The World - 2010 Digital Remaster
Shirley Bassey – Let Me Sing and I'm Happy
Paper Dolls – Something Here In My Heart
David Bowie – Starman - 2002 Digital Remaster
Buffy Sainte-Marie – Soldier Blue
Buffy Sainte-Marie – Moratorium
The Pioneers – Let Your Yeah Be Yeah
Dave And Ansel Collins – Double Barrel
Bob & Marcia – Young, Gifted And Black
Springwater – I Will Return
Hurricane Smith – Don't Let It Die
Jo Jo Gunne – Run Run Run
The Elgins – Heaven Must Have Sent You
T. Rex – Jeepster
T. Rex – Metal Guru
T. Rex – Telegram Sam
Mr Bloe – Groovin' With Mr Bloe
Blue Mink – Melting Pot
Roxy Music – Virginia Plain
New York Dolls – Jet Boy
New York Dolls – Trash
Mott The Hoople – All The Young Dudes
Faron Young – It's Four In The Morning
Melanie Safka – I Don't Eat Animals
Iggy & The Stooges – Your Pretty Face Is Going To Hell - Iggy Pop Mix
Sex Pistols – Anarchy In The UK
Sparks – This Town Ain't Big Enough For The Both Of Us
New York Dolls – Frankenstein
New York Dolls – Personality Crisis
Nancy Sinatra – Happy
Dionne Warwick – Loneliness Remembers What Happiness Forget
Jobriath – Morning Star Ship
Pony Club – Single
Ewan MacColl – Morrissey and the Russian Sailor
Kirsty MacColl – You Know It's You
Nancy Sinatra – Let Me Kiss You
Patti Smith Group – Because the Night
Brigitte Bardot – Bubble Gum
Herman's Hermits – East West 
David Bowie – Drive In Saturday - 1999 Digital Remaster


Wednesday 16 October 2013

People: a play by Alan Bennett, National Theatre on tour, The Lowry, Salford, 15.10.13



Lady Dorothy Stacpoole (Siân Phillips), former model and socialite, is approaching her dotage and sitting on a fortune in the shape of a crumbling family home stuffed to the gills with antiques. It’s just the kind of stately pile the National Trust would love to get their hands on, and that’s just what Dorothy’s sister June, an Archdeacon, has in mind. Horrified at the prospect of people swarming about the place, Dorothy is persuaded to consider a rival offer from a mysterious wealthy sect who promise to pay over the odds and keep the house mercifully free of people. After all, ‘People spoil things...’

History is once again Alan Bennett’s theme, specifically our attempts at preserving heritage. Oddly enough, it only becomes apparent that the play is actually a farce in the second half of the production, round about the time you notice the stage is peopled with two porn actors, a camp bearded Welshman and a bishop. Nobody actually mounts the stage with a toilet brush at any point, but subtlety takes a back seat during Bennett’s medium-to-heavy roasting of The National Trust and the Church of England, whose membership ‘is virtually the same’.

Dorothy nobly resists becoming ‘a metaphor for England itself’, though the play doesn’t do much to help, variously accessorising her with British hits of the ‘60s, Henry VIII’s rosary, and a collection of chamber pots containing original deposits from the likes of Kipling and Elgar. Iris (long-time companion but actually half-sister to Dorothy, played beautifully, if quietly, by Brigit Forsyth) punctuates proceedings with some glib relief, delivering a mix of blunt truth and endearing misunderstanding.

Overall though, the too-varied plot threads and dramatic motifs, and some oddly mismatched characters, drag on the play’s momentum, but the set is a character in itself, majestic and ramshackle, there are witty one-liners aplenty, and Dorothy is a gem – sad, but not sentimental, rugged and forward-facing, even against the odds – in fact, terribly English, you might say, and certainly worth preserving.