EC - A VERY BRITISH ARTIST!?
Kevin Purcell
there are times when it gets difficult to know exactly what Elvis is going
on about, but 90% of the time, those references and sensibilities, I think,
are not necessarily essential to understanding the point of the song.
They're just part of it's character and the way he chooses to express it.
For instance, you mentioned "London's Brilliant Parade". Well, you don't
have to be intimately familiar with the city to know that it's more or less
a travelogue of Elvis' memories of London. The particular placenames are
more or less irrelevant on that level. Knowing that Elvis' dad played at
the Hammersmith Palais (I think that's how the story goes) is more important
than knowing what/where Hammersmith is (though it doesn't hurt... I went to
London for the first time last summer and that song constantly popped into
my head whenever I saw a placename that was mentioned in the song). Not
that it isn't nice to "get" all the references, but the material isn't
entirely impenetrable if you don't.
Of course if you're an anglophile like me (yes, I admit it. I studied
British history in college and in graduate school), it's more endearing than
frustrating. It just makes me want to break out an atlas or an encyclopedia
to figure out what it is exactly he's talking about.
And there are other bands who are more persistently British. XTC I
love, but their use of language I find far more parochial than ECs.
-Kevin
Chris Savage
it lie and just had to mention:
>Anyway, I recently came across an ad in an old "Scotland's Magazine" for Senior
>Service cigarettes. I've always known that's what the song was about, and now
But the song is not about cigarettes. It's (nominally) about the
senior service: the Royal Navy. Which the cigarettes are named after.
All the nice girls love a sailor and all the nice sailors smoke John
Players' tabs.
--
Chris Savage Standing in the supermarket,
Godstone, Surrey, UK Shouting at the customers
Vern Pascal
mystery in anything they do. May be a little too oblique for some
sensibilities, however, they have excellent taste- rare in American
Bands. And can they ever create a mood...Jeff
Markpdb
yes, XTC are very British...no...English and have become more so over the
years. I heartily recommend their new album "Apple Venus Volume One" - terribly
english but wonderful. Incidentally...the best ERC gig I've ever seen was at
the Hammersmith Palais.
Take care,
Mark
mar...@aol.com
B Wolf
> But the song is not about cigarettes....
Sorry, I didn't mean "about" in the simple sense of the word. I was referring
to the title "Senior Service" which isn't in the common vernacular over here.
From what I hear, the song is about image-peddaling. Done, more or less, as a
series of puns on the name of a naval branch of the British armed forces, and a
brand name of cigarettes. (Point being, that smoking cigarettes is cool, (never
mind the cancer,) just as joining up is cool, (never mind the bullets.) Two
forms of image-peddaling.)
"...It's the breath you took too late. It's a death that's worse than fate..."
"...Though it may be second hand, it's by no means second rate..."