Listography - Top 5 Songs I grew up to

A Listography .

back on Kate Takes 5. And what a beaut - the Top 5 songs I grew up with. I know it's not cooking, or food in any sense, but tough. I couldn't not do this post.

I remember the thrill of being given a ‘ghettoblaster’ one with tape decks so I could record the charts every Sunday. I had hundreds of cassettes with different compilations on them all ripped off radio One. When some songs come on the radio now, I can be instantly transported back to that bedroom – the one that I tried to pretend came straight out of a Habitat catalogue…

Just 5 are very hard to choose, but I’ve just made a vat of chutney so I feel entitled to indulge myself with a glass of wine and a schmooze round YouTube to take a trip down memory lane, and choose. So here they are…

(I can’t work out how to embed the actual videos here, but I’ve put in the links which I hope will work if you’d care to watch/listen to any of these beauties.)

The Whole of the Moon, The Waterboys                               

 

More than any other song, this is one that can transport me back to a time and a place. Well, 2 actually, but I’m not going to tell you about one of them. The other place was The Warehouse in Leeds on a Friday night – usually after some underage drinking at Whitelocks. From 1987, for 2 or 3 years, Friday night revolved around a group of friends, whether we had good enough fake ID, and whether my parents would be embarrassing enough to park OUTSIDE the door of the club, in their VW Passat estate, IN THEIR NIGHTCLOTHES to pick me up. But it was all worth it to be dancing in that sweaty throng to this most amazing of songs from the glorious This is the Sea album.

Big Area, Then Jerico

 

Mark Shaw was probably my first real crush. I remember seeing Then Jerico at Leeds Poly and being totally and utterly transfixed by the beauty of the man, long leather coat over denim jacket over white T-shirt… ripped jeans.. cowboy boots…the pout, the hair. I was in LOVE…

Dignity, Deacon Blue

This is just a beautiful song. It tells a real story and I love it still. I saw Deacon Blue at Leeds Poly, and later at Birmingham NEC with my lovely French Exchange, Sonia, and another fabulous friend from school in Leeds, Louise. Just brilliant.

Watching the Wildlife, Frankie Goes to Hollywood

The secondary school I went to, you either liked Wham or Frankie. You couldn’t like both. That was An Unbreakable Rule. Me, I went with Frankie, and this song in particular had a greater resonance than most because I remember gettingto CHOOSE what went on the car stereo as we drove across Mull one year on our way to the Island of Iona for our summer holidays. This song with its rather majestic orchestration was the one that so fitted with the amazing scenery that we were driving through - although I hadn't planned it

The Boys of Summer, Don Henley

I can’t believe of all the songs I could have chosen this is the one that has made it here, but there it is. It was nearly going to be Stepping Out by Joe Jackson, but no, my secret penchant for American middle of the road drive time is bared for you all to see. I wanted to be that girl driving down that beach, sun bleached hair in the wind with some chiselled bloke waiting for me after I’d had an amazing  summer fling. All total fantasy of course – at the time I was sporting rather unfetching specs, and very bad taste in clothes, but a girl can dream…

Oh my but I’ve enjoyed myself this evening. And of course, I could have been watching Dallas, but I was never allowed when I was a child, and somehow, doing this was more appealing. That and the chutney....