Quite an early one - 1962 - but these guys are looking pretty sharp. Nice tie pins (in the pic below) Enjoy - perhaps don't go up on your own roof today if you've had the snow... It's the question that no-one is asking, it's the question we could all do without knowing the answer to: Which version of Seven Days Too Long is best? Answer: it's the Chuck Woods one, but I like the homage paid to the song by DMR. Would you believe I used to use this as my alarm clock back in the day. I got a fancy new alarm clock for Xmas one year and this was the CD in the thing which started up every morning before school right before 6:45am. Or swimming before 5am. Things were tough back then. This is actually a pretty decent song that I have been allergic to ever since that time simply because it had a kind of Pavlov's dog terrorising effect on my brain (as alarm clocks tend to after a while). Lesson: never put your favourite song as your alarm clock. Something a bit special for you guys today. Brought to my attention last week were these guys - Heavyball. Bit of ska, bit of Mod going on here (at least in the look) and that classic, slightly bouncier 2-toney sound you might have originally associated with the Specials... but slightly happier. They are from Nottingham, but nowadays they can be found kicking around London... like everyone sensible... [here comes the abuse] They are a bit zany, but then I personally don't think you could pull off the ska style without a bit self-awareness nowadays. Anyway if you want more, go to their site here. As far as I'm concerned, a quite underrated song but I wouldn't go as far as to say a classic. I actually bought the Secret Affair Anthology so I know all the shit they came out with from start to finish. Perhaps that's a bit harsh. Time for Action is great, this is pretty good and they have a few other decent ones. But Ian Page is still a total dork. It certainly feels like that this Monday morning! Yeah so we’ve had all the discussions. The Who aren’t Mod, blah-de-blah. Now we’ve established this, can we take a moment to appreciate the clothing that a certain Mr Meaden (presumably) dressed these guys in for this video? Apart from the fact that Daltrey seems to magically change his full outfit in the first minute and they all seem to have something wrong with their necks, this video is a treasure trove. Desert boots. Rollnecks. John Smedleys-style tops. Button-down shirts. Even Bretons make an appearance. Wish it was like that in clubs nowadays... Usually LG sticks to the Manc Mod Look, which I perceive to be a bit scruffier than the 59 Mod Look, but it's no less cool.
However it DOES make it unusual to see him in a rollneck. Consider all of yourselves lucky. This is a rare moment. One of the slightly cooler sixties bands of the period course, but you don't want to know where they all ended up. The video is very grainy, but I'm liking the drummer's military-style jacket in this one. I know it's unfashionable to say so, but Oasis did do a few decent songs after the year 2000 and I reckon this is one of them. It's a bit trippy (like the rest of the album) and, thinking about it, you can sense the different musical direction NG was going to take when the band broke up not long after. It doesn't really sound like an Oasis song at all. Following the general theme for the week - the Kinks are back. LIke I mentioned before I'm not the hugest of fans of the Kinks' music in general, but they have some decent numbers and in this video they look absolutely sick. That voice tho! Also, the girls screaming - utterly bizarre. Maybe someone can fill me in on this one - in @MichaelRees84 ‘s battle of the bands on twitter, the Kinks recently beat the Small Faces by popular vote.
Obviously this doesn’t mean they’re more Mod (if there is such a thing), but it’s something I was thinking about - they weren’t exactly as uptight and buttoned up as the Small Faces were … you might even say they kept up a slightly hippy-esque style. Yet they are spoken of in the same breath. They were of the period and dressed a bit similar, but I can't say I've ever seen them on scooter. They seem somehow a bit more eccentric to be into the Mod scene. Of course this is my opinion - perhaps you've got some insider details. Anyway here’s a few of the more Moddy pics that I can take inspo from. While I'm not a huge fan of Plan B in general, his album the Defamation of Strickland Banks is very much a favourite. A few comrades of mine suspect this was his big money album so that he could fund his real interests (i.e. more rap), which is fair enough. From his other work, you can see that his interest in making souly sounding music is cursory. However, as with everything, beauty is in the eye of the beholder and just because it was squeezed out like a factory making sausages in an act of naked commercialism, it doesn't mean there are not some very strong tracks on it. |
Discussed here:
All
Other sites you should check out:Archives
May 2018
AuthorMod blogger and style advocate. For all the latest pearls of wisdom, read this blog! |