Snapshots #398: Songs Named After Hitchcock Films

Good evening. My name is Alfred Hitchcock... and these are my films, set to music.

15. Insomniacs before a Beckham.

Not David or Victoria, but Brooklyn Beckham...

And these guys had no sleep till they met him.

The Beastie Boys - Sabotage

Anyone shouting at their computer, "but the Hitchcock film was Saboteur!" You're right. Saboteur was his 1942 movies, starring Robert Cummings, Priscilla Lane and Norman Lloyd. But six years prior to that, he also had a film called Sabotage, starring Sylvia Sidney, Oskar Homolka, and John Loder.

Thank you, Ghost of Barry Norman. 

14. Lacking substance or importance.

It's Immaterial - Rope

13. Unhappy aphrodisiacs at Heaven's Gate.

Heaven's Gate was a cult. 

Blue Oyster Cult - Dial M For Murder

12. Nick was a big fan of her movie band.

Nick Lowe loved the sound of breaking glass... which was the name of Hazel's band in the movie of the same name.

Hazel O'Connor - Rebecca

11. Can be good, but I was never any good at them.

Be a good sport, will you?

Sports - Strangers On A Train

Love that video, it's so 1980.

10. I'm with them.

"I'm with the band."

The Band - Stage Fright

9. Could she be a robot, then?

"Robot, then" was an anagram...

Beth Orton - Shadow Of A Doubt

8. Kojak's full name.

Kojak was Telly, so this must be...

Television - Torn Curtain

7. Accept no substitutes.

The Originals - Suspicion

6. Fancy a joint?

Elbow - The Birds

5. Ripper in a Jewish robe.

A kittel is a Jewish robe, worn by Jack...

Jack Kittel - Psycho

There are, of course, two other versions of this famous song... but they've both featured here before.

4. Aaaaah! -Z. Stranger town. 

A scream, Jay-Z and Hawkins, the town in Stranger Things. But I imagine the photo was enough...

Screamin' Jay Hawkins - Frenzy

3. Second person.

Second person stories are written about you. Second is also 2.

U2 - Vertigo

2. Basie & The Unisex Shoes... unpeel that one!

Anagram! (Obviously.)

Siouxsie & The Banshees - Spellbound

1. Duffy defected.

Their original singer was Stephen Duffy. He left, to be replaced by Le Bon.

Duran Duran - Notorious

Set your compass North by North West and it should steer you in the direction of more Snapshots next Saturday...

Celebrity Jukebox #65: Tom Verlaine

Well, the Cadillac

It pulled out of the graveyard

Pulled up to me

All they said, "get in, get in"

Then the Cadillac

It puttered back into the graveyard

Me, I got out again

Just as it came time to fire up the Celebrity Jukebox again, the news of Tom Verlaine's passing was announced. I didn't build this jukebox purely as a memorial machine, but it seems to increasingly be used that way. Ashes to Ashes...

 

Being quite an influential figure in the world of rock 'n' roll, Tom Verlaine pops up in quite a few songs. Here are a strong selection...

The Go-Betweens - When She Sang About Angels

When she sang about a boy

Kurt Cobain

I thought what a shame it wasn't about

Tom Verlaine

The Waterboys -  Some of My Best Friends Are Trains

When the gang came down here again

And they're phoning up Australia and they call each other names

And they all just wanna look like Richard Hell and Tom Verlaine

Some of my best friends are trains

Frank Lloyd Wleft - The Gilesgate Monologues 

I left school with 12 GCSEs, 3 A Levels and only one good song

I'm just another Russell Group punk

Just another Distrokid kid

Just another dime-store Tom Verlaine

Waiting for my 15 seconds of fame

The Family Cat - Tom Verlaine

April the 7th, 1979

Didn’t we breakfast together?

We celebrated my seventeenth

And heard Tom Verlaine together

We shouted from my bedroom window

And weren’t we happy that day?

But perhaps it was the whisky

Well at least no-one died that day

The Damned - Idiot Box

I can't turn you off

I just try and laugh you off

Tom Verlaine you maybe are

But you sure ain't rock n roll

Aden - Brief Summer Rains

Nights by the lake

Ribs and lemonade 

Tom Verlaine

Tape on auto-play

Longstocking - Radio Agony

If I could dance

With Tom Verlaine

He's the one

On the television

Alvvays - Tom Verlaine

That when you walk away

It's gonna be for good

You were my Tom Verlaine

Just sitting on the hood

Snapshots #275: Top Ten Songs With A Hole In Them

This is Courtney Love. Her band is called Hole.

Yesterday, I gave you a picture of Bernard Cribbins who sang Hole In The Ground. I figured that would be too easy as one of the songs, even though it is the greatest song ever recorded with a hole in it.

Here are ten more holes...

10. Moby's ways.

Moby sang about Extreme Ways.

Extreme - Hole Hearted

9. Abaaaaartment.

That would be where the baaaa lambs live.

Sheephouse - Hole In The Sky

8. How Bob Lind signs his name, in a Backstreets, on his way to the next whiskey bar.

Bob Lind (of Elusive Butterfly fame) would sign his name B.Lind. Add to that the Backstreet Boys and a line from Alabama Song and you get...

The Blind Boys of Alabama - Way Down In The Hole

7. Big Red Dog gets a Ruby.

Clifford is the Big Red Dog. A Ruby Murray is a Curry.

Clifford Curry - She Shot A Hole In My Soul

6. Rose Variety + Where Prince Met Robbers + Scottish January.

Stone Roses + Thieves In The Temple + Scottish band Pilot, who sang January.

Stone Temple Pilots - Trippin' On A Hole In A Paper Heart

5. Breeding ignorance and feeding radiation.

That's a line from Television (The Drug of the Nation) by The Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy.

Television - Foxhole

4. Orange vision.

Tangerine Dream - The Burning Hole

3. Oxford detective from the block.

Lewis was the Oxford Detective, Jenny came from the block.

Jenny Lewis - Rabbit Hole

2. The trouble with nice source and strange Fitzgerald.

The Trouble With Harry. "Nice Source" is a literal translation of Bella Fonte. Strange Fitzgerald = Odd Etta. Except... as Ernie points out, that clue didn't work because I had somehow confused Ella Fitzgerald with Etta James. D'oh. Apologies, all.

Harry Belafonte & Odetta - A Hole in the Bucket

1. Often served with Jam.

That would be a Traffic Jam.

Let's not forget Neil's version of this!

There'll be a Hole load more Snapshots to solve next Saturday...

Saturday Snapshots #60 - The Answers

"What are the answers to yesterday's Saturday Snapshots, Rol? I Need To Know!"

Apparently this week's Saturday Snapshots was a tough one. OK guys, don't have a Breakdown. Hopefully you'll Feel A Whole Lot Better now... well done to Lynchie for reclaiming the early bird crown this week...



10. Nathaniel holds his own against the 7th rabbit house. Control.

Nate is short for Nathaniel and he is holding a dog.

Rabbits live in warrens. G is the 7th letter of the alphabet.

Warren G & Nate Dogg - Regulate

9. Goes with Bella and Mad to see the sun, wireless.

Bella-Donna
Mad-(D)onna.

Summer sun.

Wireless radio.

Donna Summer - On The Radio

8. Straightening the shelves, always in the same direction.

Whenever I put up a shelf, I have to make sure it's level.

Going in the same direction would be one way.

The Levellers - One Way

7. Uncaring sods go for a 42.195 kilometre run.

A bit obscure, but... tune!

Heartless Bastards - Marathon

6. Where prayers are answered... could be 50% better.

"The part of a Methodist meeting house formerly occupied by worshippers who responded to the preacher's utterances with occasional shouts of ‘Amen!’."

The Amen Corner - (If Paradise Is) Half As Nice

5. Portable computer goes through customs without any trouble.

If you don't know this one, you should give it a go. Kooky but fun.

Laptop - Nothing To Declare

4. Enterprise on rocky foundations.

The Enterprise was a Starship.

Starship - We Built This City (On Rock 'n' Roll)

Apparently, this has been voted the worst song of the 80s. Hard to imagine why, in a decade where Stock, Aitken & Waterman were active.

3. Fall singer becomes lunatic on the box.

Mark E. sounds very much like Marquee.

Lunatic means driven mad by the moon.

Television is The Box. (Although they're not really boxes anymore, are they?)

Television - Marquee Moon

2. Proustian detective agency from the 80s.

Proust was Marcel.

The Blue Moon Detective Agency was where David Addison & Maddie Hayes worked in the 80s.

The Marcels - Blue Moon

So much better than the Showaddywaddy cover... discuss?

1. Where Richard met Judy... after you left.

Richard Of York Gave Battle In Vain is a mnemonic to help you remember the colours in a rainbow.

Judy Garland went Somewhere Over The Rainbow.

I Won't Back Down. Saturday Snapshots returns next week!

My Top Ten Elevator Songs

I used to be a lift attendant.

"Really, how did you find that job?"

It had it's up and downs.

Special mention to the Frantic Elevators (probably the only time Hucknall will feature on this blog), Lift To Experience and the excellent Thirteenth Floor Elevators.


10. Misty's Big Adventure - Elevator, Escalator, Stairs

MBA seem to have all their up/down options covered here.

9. Jeff Lynne - Lift Me Up

Because Jeff, being an Englishman, knows we call 'em lifts. Great song; seriously bad video. 

8. Dubstar - Elevator Song

It's easy to forget Dubstar. One listen to this will remind you not to. And Sarah Blackwood is from Halifax, so extra points there too.

7. Stars - Elevator Love Letter

 An office affair with a rich girl...

My office glows all night long
It's a nuclear show and the stars are gone
Elevator, elevator
Take me home

...is a far less crude elevator-related come on than the one we'll hear at #1.  

6. The Apples In Stereo - Hey, Elevator

...although "Elevator, take me straight to your bed" is, perhaps, our least subtle offering of the night.

5. Grandaddy - Elevate Myself

Classic anti-rock star lyrics from Jason Lytle & co.

I don't wanna work all night and day
On writing songs that make the young girls cry
Or playing little solos on the keyboards
So the kids will ask me how and why...

4. Television - Elevation

You can't go wrong with a track (any track!) from the majestic Marquee Moon.

3. Jackie Wilson - (Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher & Higher

All. Time. Classic.

2. Prince - Let's Go Crazy

The video, of course, is nowhere to be found on the internet because Prince hates letting people hear his songs. But if the elevator tries to bring you down... go crazy: punch a higher floor!

1. Aerosmith - Love In An Elevator

One day I'll compile a Top Ten Cheesy Spoken Intros or a Top Ten Videos That Start Before The Song Begins or even a Top Ten Sexist Gags In Rock Videos. In all three, Love In An Elevator will come top. 

I can't help but love both the song and the video though... they're everything that was (gloriously) wrong about 80's American rock.




Which floor are you getting off at today?

My Top Ten Songs Named After Hitchcock Movies

After last week's Top Ten Psycho Songs, I was inspired to compile a list of songs that share a name with other famous Hitchcock movies...

10. Duran Duran - Notorious

Hands up if you, like me, used to sing "Mo-mo-monotonous!" whenever this came on the radio. Looking back through nostalgic goggles, it's not that bad.

Is it?

9. Ash - Spellbound

Tim Wheeler's got us in his spell...

8. The Libertines - Vertigo

There may be a U2 song with the same title. You won't find it here.

7. Foo Fighters - Rope

Wonder if the Foos recorded this in one take, as Hitch tried to do with Rope?

6. Television - Torn Curtain

Very unsettling, like all the best Hitchcock movies.

5. Screamin' Jay Hawkins - Frenzy

Great lip-gargling on this track from 1957.

4. Beth Orton - Shadow Of A Doubt

It's true that I have got a head full
Of voices saying the first thing that's in their heart
And I go to throw a ball with my best intention
And it gets caught up and carried away
In completely the opposite direction

3. Elvis Presley - Suspicion

From the legendary songwriting partnership of Pomus & Shuman. Gee. Knee. Us.

2. Amanda Palmer & Neil Gaiman - Psycho

Of course, the Elvis Costello version is better, but I made that a Number One already. So here's the wonderful Amanda Palmer with her slightly less wonderful hubby on vocals. It shouldn't work... and yet, it kinda does.

Download this, free & legal, along with Amanda's version of Lana Del Rey's Video Games, and more... by clicking here.

1. Elbow - The Birds

Like much of Guy Garvey's songwriting, there's a drama here that's really quite sinister...

The birds are the keepers of our secret
As they saw us where we lay
In the deepest grass of springtime
In a reckless guilty haze

OK, those were my favourite songs that share a title with Hitchcock films. Do you have a Rear Window, North By North West or To Catch A Thief in your record collection?