Absolute

On Friday night I got in from an hour in the pub and watched/fast forwarded through a few backed up episodes of Top Of The Pops, currently repeating episodes from the summer of 1984 (but only those ones without any convicted sex offenders presenting). Apart from The Smiths (Heaven Knows..., my least favourite Smiths song), Frankie (Two Tribes, number one, frighteningly 2017 thematically) and Bananarama (Rough Justice, a good song, the three girls dancing like real people actually dance rather than robo-dancers), the thing that jumped out at me- almost actually leapt from the screen on top of me, honest- was Absolute by Scritti Politti.

It's a long way from Skank Bloc Bologna to Cupid And Psyche '85. Absolute, a song I'd largely missed before, is a beauty, full of mid 80s pop and r'n'b flourishes, drum pads and synths and Green gamely strumming a guitar that I can't hear anywhere in the mix. The tune sounds simple but is pretty complex. Little musical parts appear and disappear, subtly different from ones that have gone before. There's some mid 80s funk in there too and some changes and skips that make the song move about and almost cause you have to pause to catch your breath. On top of it all sits Green's vocal, a falsetto that floats away dreamily but somehow holds the whole thing together. I read the description 'avant-pop' somewhere (which seems like a typically serious way to intellectualise something so joyful- and I've no doubt Green and others did intellectualise it) but 33 years later this just sounds like a fucking great, open minded, inventive pop song. What a way to start my weekend and what a way to start your Monday

Also, Princess Diana hair with Nike Windrunner jacket. Sick.

Absolute

The two Top Of the Pops performances can't be played on Youtube because they are 'blocked in [my] country on copyright grounds'. Top Of The Pops is blocked in the UK. Nope, me either. Here's the video instead.