http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMlzfpwJZuc

Once upon a time one could watch a romantic comedy whose main attraction for men was the distant possibility of glimpsing Alyson Hannigan's flute being used inappropriately. (Although I freely admit that, as a heterosexual male, I am ill-placed to judge the frisson of Jason Biggs' culinary experiments). However since that particular film franchise has thundered on past the bounds of good taste, or even good bad taste, let us divert our attention from the films to the name.
http://www.iwatchstuff.com/2010/02/18/american-pie.jpg

The phrase originates with a 1971 album and it's title song, american pie. Prior to researching this journal,…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Dsz4dB6DuM

At time of writing, my album charts are broken, so that seems like a good excuse to write about a band who have no playable tracks on last.fm. I have decided to pick the undisputed greatest pop band of all time. Of course this presents me with a challenge as a writer. Since numerous writers have already documented every nuance of their career.

I think my best bet is to document my personal contemporary memories, which although garbled, and necessarily childish, are at least unique to me. I can point out a few titbits of objective fact along the…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7iD_qZ3hTDo
Althea & Donna - Uptown Top Ranking

I have picked a representative example of the compilations that Trojan frequently issues to show off their back catalogue. They also do box sets. I remember buying several about a dozen years ago when I was teaching myself Jamaican Creole. I was having to learn because I was smitten but my beloved was 'fresh off the boat' and we needed to communicate. (I married her about a year later and are still together…a bit of luck and it could be happily ever after).

http://userserve-ak.last.fm/serve/500/3920349/Trojan.gif

The distinctive logo shows a Greek warrior's helmet…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8vLlpJc9mW0

This was the first album I ever bought with my own money. A couple of months earlier I had been treated by a great aunt to a trip to Harrods for my 13th birthday. I was allowed to choose one item from the store as a present and emerged with a copy of

http://www.itz-art.com/art_gal/rd_08.jpg
Yes - Tales from Topographic Oceans
I had been seduced by the beautiful Roger Dean artwork and the memories of listening to, my friend, Adam's copy of the yes album. Unfortunately, when I got home and played it, I didn't like the music much.…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a55E6cXPris

When I was 15 or 16 years old, I had a friend called Hazel. She was descended from the Irish Ashkenazi Jewish community, and we were both volunteer youth leaders for Dror, a Socialist Zionist youth club.

Hazel was tall and willowy with no breasts to speak of. She had a vivacious 'bubbly' personality and curly brown 'jewfro' hair. She was also Bobby's girl, Bobby being the most senior youth leader in the club at the time. We managed to be good friends in spite of the havoc that this situation wreaked on my adolescent thought processes.

Every…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6tlSx0jkuLM

We lost another female blues singer to the demons that she dredged from her soul so that she could sing them to us. Magnified and Sanctified is God's great name. Amy Winehouse followed in the tradition of Bessie Smith and Janis Joplin, but male blues greats mostly have better longevity.

In the 1950s recordings by the early blues greats were seen as almost worthless by white America. Consequently they arrived in British ports as ballast on returning cargo ships, where they reached a new audience in the British youth and gave rise to great bands like the…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D2wUq-aTjpA

It was the dying years of the Apartheid regime in South Africa; after the release of Free Nelson Mandela, but before de Klerk had opened negotiations with him.

Paul Simon was already a famous singer-songwriter. He had made his name with Simon & Garfunkel. But he had made some classic songs after his split with Art Garfunkel. He went to South Africa and made a number of 'joint-venture' songs with Black South African artists.

http://userserve-ak.last.fm/serve/300x300/43607361.gif
Paul Simon - Graceland

It was hugely controversial at the time: should it be treated as a breach of the cultural…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z9DVJE_bhVU

The Troggs were a British band at the time of the britpop phenomenon. Led by a great singer-songwriter, Reg Presley, they produced strong, blues-based pop. There songs were huge hits … for other people.

For example, who can forget wet, wet, wet's seemingly endless sojourn in the charts with love is in the air. And wild thing has been successful for everyone from jimi hendrix to the goodies.

http://userserve-ak.last.fm/serve/300x300/48610199.jpg
the troggs - Greatest Hits (Dutch)

So how can we explain their lack of commercial success? Perhaps it is in the name. At first you might think,…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usaeUUAAnLM

I vaguely remember that, when I was small, there was a situation comedy called Never Mind the Quality, Feel the Width'. By the standard implied in that phrase, Leftfield are poor value. In a career spanning 14 years (with an 8 year gap from 2002-2008) they have produced a grand total of two studio albums, each of which took about four years to make.

However, each of those albums has been a masterpiece!

The first thing you notice about them is the distinctiveness of the cover art.

http://userserve-ak.last.fm/serve/300x300/59835135.jpg
leftism features a shark's jaw in front of a speaker cone.…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nxHcx7FO8nI

James Callaghan's term as prime minister was a disastrous period for the UK economy. The postwar economic prescription of Keynes was that governments should borrow in times of recession and repay in times of boom, to adjust their economies to the desired level of employment. However treasuries had been much better at borrowing than at repaying, and now the prospects rising unemployment, falling growth and high inflation.

In Britain, the economic strains were compounded by the need for social attitudes and institutions to adjust to the loss of empire. This was generating racial tensions, which were cleverly exploited by…