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Conversation: Dan Rivkin and 'Cosi Fan Tutti Frutti'
335 Plays2 years ago
Few releases in Squeeze history generate as much commentary as 'Cosi Fan Tutti Frutti.' While 1985 saw the band reform with original keyboard player Jools Holland and introduced bassist Keith Wilkinson, this album has had its share of criticisms (from its 'sound' of the period) to praises (the songs!). Dan Rivkin weighs in with his enthusiastic and insightful observations on why this release needs to be revisited from a 2022 perspective and how we can help Squeeze fans appreciate the word 'synthesizer.'
Dan is the curator of They May Be Parted, a weblog dedicated to an understanding, deep dive of The Beatles 'Get Back/Let It Be' sessions in January 1969.
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Transcript
Introduction to the 'Cool for Cats' podcast
00:00:08
Speaker
Hello, and welcome to Cool for Cats with me, Amy Hughes. We're inviting you in for black coffee and a chat about our favorite band Squeeze.
Guest Introduction: Dan Rivkin and His Squeeze Expertise
00:00:16
Speaker
In this episode, I'm welcoming Dan Rivkin, noted expert on The Beatles with his now 10-year blog, They May Be Parted, detailing their time in January 1969. And most importantly for this podcast, he is, and I quote, father of Squeeze on the web, end quote.
Dan's Squeeze Journey and Fan Website
00:00:37
Speaker
Hello, Dan. How are you, Amy? I'm doing well. Excellent. Bit of a, you know, what can you say at this time of year and every other year, it seems we were forging ahead. And the one thing we have to talk about that super positive is squeeze because they came through 2021 unscathed. Would you say? Yes. Yes. I also want to remark I am drinking black coffee right now by complete coincidence to stay warm.
00:01:08
Speaker
and to stay as alert and perky as possible here at four in the afternoon. Thank you very much for that because your perky personality has come through loud and clear with all the work that you have to do, and especially with all of that concerning the Beatles.
00:01:27
Speaker
father of Squeeze on the web. That's true. That needs a little bit of a backstory explanation before we go on to the topic at hand. That quote is not mine. That is from the old Squeeze fan website.
00:01:41
Speaker
as a layer taken over. I started the first the first squeeze fan website in it was 95 96. And it was you know, I was near the end of college. And I was hoping to have a job at some point after after college. And I thought, well, HTML, you know, version one or whatever it was at the time, this sounds like something I should probably learn, just in case there's one of those internet jobs out there.
00:02:07
Speaker
for me. So I went ahead and I built a website and I put, you know, lyrics to songs on it and there's things blinked and, you know, scanned photos on the library scanner and all that kind of stuff. And I put together a website that eventually got noticed by someone who knew the band and then it got sort of taken over by other people. And along the way, I handed off the keys to some able people and I was given a credit
00:02:35
Speaker
as father of Squeeze on the web. My first offspring. And as I noted in a little bit of a chat before this podcast, demand a blood test. Yes, I take credit for some things, not all of them, but
00:02:57
Speaker
Done all right.
Significance of Cozy Fan Tutti Frutti in Squeeze's Discography
00:02:58
Speaker
Done all right. Yeah, you have done very well. You have done very well with that other band. But for purposes of this podcast, as noted to your listeners, Dan and I discussed what would be a challenging topic, one that would really perk up Mr. Rivkin for discussion here. And I suggested Cozy Van Tutti Frutti.
00:03:27
Speaker
uh, thinking that could be a little bit of a ripe discussion considering where, uh, how many years on now Dan 30, 35, 37 ish. It was, it was, yeah, August 85. So we can, we can throw the half in there. So yeah, 37 and a half, right? Would that be, or is it three, six and a half? See, this is where I was, when I was in college, it was for journalism, it was not for math. So it's 20, let, if we go back to 2021, August, 2021,
00:03:56
Speaker
That would be to 85 is 36. Yeah, and then the half. So 36 and a half years.
00:04:02
Speaker
Well, it's an interesting album for you and I to discuss because I feel that this, as you had mentioned before, we even started this recording here on this podcast, that it deserves another look-see, another hair-see, because a lot of people who are Squeeze fans jump right into singles, 45s and under. And this is the first album that came out proper after that release.
00:04:31
Speaker
And it was a reformation to kind of give everybody a little bit of a backstory from that perspective. This was the first official band release post the band breaking up in 1982 after Sweets from a Stranger. And I've always, I'll say it, loved this album. I love it. That's fantastic. Yeah.
00:04:55
Speaker
Overall, Dan, why don't you jump in here and just to kind of give me your overall about liking this album, having problems. We're going to address that because that's the elephant in the room, obviously, in its time period. But why do you think you and I should be making the case for saying, hey, this is a good album? I want to start by saying with my history of Squeeze fandom, just in case that context helps
00:05:25
Speaker
Helps with this. I became a Squeeze fan sort of, I want to say late. I knew of Squeeze prior to the breakup. I was younger, I was buying records, but I wasn't really buying that many records. By the time they broke up, I vaguely recall loves crashing waves on MTV. Just is just one of many, a video. I do not recall cozy. And by that time we had moved from one house to another
00:05:55
Speaker
And we didn't have, it was a newer development that didn't have cable. And you can't go on YouTube and see what videos I've missed. So it was just a whole gap of stuff pretty much until 1989, or 88. In 89,
00:06:14
Speaker
I remember watching the Frankly Speaking documentary on VH1, and I literally just stumbled across it. I heard of Squeeze. I knew of a Squeeze. I couldn't place you what song they did. I couldn't place you Hourglass, even though that was a hit just two years earlier. But I watched Frankly Speaking, absolutely fell in love. I thought, these are funny, interesting musical songs.
00:06:39
Speaker
figures. Right. And it just they completely brought me in. I bought Frank the next day. I was I was I mean, teenager, the only kid in high school time who is, you know, like eager squeeze fan. And that point, well, what's the next thing you do? You go backwards and forwards and all around. I my brother had a copy of Singles. So I listened to that. And like, just like all of us, you know, it's every song is different. And how is this band the same as this band, the same as this band on every track on that? And then
00:07:08
Speaker
and then to Frank, but I loved it all. But there was one thing that was missing at that time, or I guess two things. I went back and got that line on, and then I got cozy. And cozy was so odd in that it was musical and lyrically them. It was so dark. It sounded of a different time, but in 1989, 1985 didn't sound that old, right?
00:07:38
Speaker
If, you know, Dyer Straits had synthesizers and were a hit band and, you know, Dancing in the Dark, you know, Springsteen had synthesizers and it was a hit sound. It's not like synthesizers and an 80s sound meant dated necessarily. And I, as a teenager, I'm already bouncing all over the place.
80s Music Scene and Squeeze's Sound
00:07:56
Speaker
As a teenager, kid in high school, you know, in probably by 1990s when I had the record, you know,
00:08:04
Speaker
these half the songs I couldn't relate with in any fashion because they're about divorce and they're about being drunk and being hung over and terrorism, which you watch on television and all these really dark subjects. But at the same time, there's like, I learned how to pray. And it's like, oh my God, you know, falling in love with your best friend in high school, that's such like a, you know, you could really, really feel that sort of lyric.
00:08:31
Speaker
And everything sounded good, and they were so interesting. And to me, at that time, it was like, that was just another Squeeze album. There was Frank, there was Cozy, there was Babylon on. Gotti Side Story, I mean, I got them all, and it was just one of their seven, eight records.
00:08:46
Speaker
Yeah, and cozy is an interesting situation to even approach when you have to go back to it because we look at it now and say, and let's just come right out and say it like you said, it's dated. Why is it dated? Why do people just automatically hook?
00:09:05
Speaker
onto that. And the first thing they say, well, we're going to hook it on the producer, Lori Latham, because that's his sound. That's not the squeeze sound. And I went back and looked at Lori's credentials previous to doing this album, this cozy album. So he started off with Monty Python. Right. Did the Lumberjack song.
00:09:33
Speaker
Why not? You could retire after doing that, right? Yeah, exactly. And working with George Harrison. We're going to also, dear listeners, we will be working in some Beatles references here. It's hard not to.
00:09:50
Speaker
Then Laurie went on to work with Manford Mann and Ian Drury. Then he had his huge, huge breakthrough working as the producer for Paul Young's No Parlay. That was 1983.
00:10:04
Speaker
So you see all of these things coming up to 1985 or 1984 in that era. He worked on Echo and the Bunnymen. He also worked on the big Paul Young, the next one, Secrets of Association.
00:10:21
Speaker
And, you know, it seems like it all should work together for him. And then this whole, you know, the bad S-word comes in, the whole synthesizer thing comes in. And I also looked at the work he did with the Stranglers, and I really enjoy, you know, Skin Deep.
00:10:44
Speaker
So that has like almost the same feel cadence as a lot of cozy has. So let me let me get your opinion at least on the general overall there's some good uses of synthesizer. There are some
00:11:00
Speaker
bad uses of synthesizer. Is it overdone? Is it really just smothering Gilson? Is that where we're having the issue? Because I'll tell you, the first two things that we hear on Cozy are Gilson and Keith. And they're both, excuse me, kicking ass on your name.
00:11:22
Speaker
It's funny you mention that because I have this written. I have like 15 pieces of paper and seven windows and like a stack of books. I mean, I have all these things I should have clicked in one place, but I didn't. One of the things I wrote was this album starts off. And I was thinking about this in the context of Annie Get Your Gun, right? How upset he was that he wasn't involved initially, Gilson.
00:11:45
Speaker
just like you said, the opening statement of this album is Gilson. And you have to wonder whether that was a deliberate thing, whether it's just a nice coincidence, whether it's something which, you know, this is the kind of stuff we do, right? Pick at these little details and blow them up into something that, hey, maybe this is for real, right? So, but you're absolutely right. It's Gilson and Keith is obviously all over this record. And it's such a different, there are times where I sit here and think, you know, maybe it's,
00:12:15
Speaker
Keith and the fretless bass and that sort of sound that kind of turns me off. But then I said, listen to Frank and play, which I absolutely love. And it's like, well, no, it can't be that. I don't turn it. I don't get turned off by it there. So it can't be just his style on that instrument.
00:12:33
Speaker
No, I don't think so. And of course, if we're a Squeeze fan, we're also a different and Tilbrook album fan as well. So that's where we got introduced to Keith Wilkinson's style. So obviously his input into Cozy coming in as a full-fledged member of Squeeze
00:12:53
Speaker
is unmistakable. And perhaps with the advent of doing this particular kind of production work that was in vogue, I mean, for want of a better statement,
00:13:08
Speaker
That's where the band ended up being in the studio because certainly, like you said, that was the music that they produced back then. That was what was available, the sound. You know, he could say
Recording Challenges: Jules Holland and Brussels Experience
00:13:24
Speaker
Gilson.
00:13:25
Speaker
Well, I think these drums should probably sound like Phil Collins because Phil Collins is sitting on top of the world in 1985, that gated drumming sound. So every everything is going to focus in on that. My understanding is that Glenn will just he's just like a schmoor, give me a smorgasbord of toys and we'll get something out of it. And maybe that's also part of the problem, if you want to call it that, with people
00:13:53
Speaker
getting into this album. And it's hard because we would like to stay within the album itself and try not to compare it to before and after. It's really hard because you've noted that reviews for the album when it came out were kind of okay. I think even to the point that they were strong. I'm going to call up one right now. I'm not going to read verbatim. The Rolling Stone review
00:14:24
Speaker
Each track on Cozy Fan 2D Fruity is so musically involuted and psychologically involving that listening to the entire LP is like watching all 10 episodes of a miniseries in one sitting. The record is shaded in tones from blue to gray. It has a very ambitious post-Sgt. Pepperfield in the songwriting. It is recorded in an early 80s way with Contempo, keyboard and drum treatments in the forefront.
00:14:47
Speaker
Rolling Stones comparing it to Sgt. Pepper straight away. And also, and I think this is really interesting, if we want to have a discussion about rehabilitating an album 30 years later, 36 years later, it describes the album as watching all 10 episodes of a miniseries in one sitting. 2022, that's what we do.
00:15:10
Speaker
Yeah, it's kind of fortuitous in a way for somebody to be writing that back then. I mean, nobody is arguing the point that that is what Chris does well, because the overused description of a kitchen sink drama is obviously well worn, but well deserved. I think that as we discuss along the lines of how the record
00:15:37
Speaker
is perceived, the band didn't seem to have a problem with it. And as I noted, if we look back at what was tops and then look now, you're saying, well, nobody seemed to have a problem with other music coming from that period. Now, why are we so hung up? Is it because we hold this band so dear to our heart that we should be like, what were you guys thinking?
00:16:06
Speaker
What was going on? You know, that's a good question. I'm holding in my hand the Tilburg demos when Daylight appears. Right. And there are four of the songs from Cozy appear on that in Glenn's just it's just Glenn doing the demos. And three of them have the have that sound. It's there. These are not stripped down demos. He built them up just like he built them up throughout his career. But it's not as if
00:16:35
Speaker
Lori Latham tacked on that sound onto them. I mean, this is how Glenn imagined these songs in some way, or to some degree. But, you know, this is something else which is on my head, which I thought about. You know, you look at the first single for the album, preceding Cozy, last time forever. You have samples, which, you know, I mean, I don't know exactly, I know that this is Big Audio Dynamite came out
00:17:04
Speaker
after Cozy, I don't know when it was written or recorded. I love Big Iodine. And using those samples, a movie sample, I mean, that was their bread and butter, right? And they're innovative and they are treated as rightfully so, rightfully so, as innovators in their field. It's almost like we view Squeeze using that sample as sort of like tacky.
Squeeze's Position in the 1985 Music Scene
00:17:34
Speaker
or like the voice modulation and things like that. It was inventive. It may not have always worked. The experiment may not have always worked, but they were doing something different. They weren't just coming back and doing another Black Coffee Embed and another... They weren't trying to redo singles, even though they could have.
00:17:53
Speaker
Exactly. And I think, I mean, let's have a quick, you know, point to point on having Jules Holland come back to the band officially for this release. Are people a little upset? Now, there's also a backstory. People are upset kind of like, OK, well, they're expecting Jules on this album. They're not quite getting Jules as we have come to remember him past tense on the other albums.
00:18:23
Speaker
And was a blanket thrown on jewels, so to speak. And we'll do the backstory because I know you know the story, but maybe listeners don't, is that this album was recorded outside their comfort zone, so to speak. It was recorded in Brussels. And there wasn't a lot to do, apparently.
00:18:46
Speaker
when you're in Brussels in a studio with Lori Latham and Glenn Tilbrook, who likes to touch everything. And you're not even there to soak up culture. It's not like Paul McCartney going to Kenya to do Band on the Run or going to Jamaica to do this. They're going there because it's like a tax haven for Lori Latham.
00:19:09
Speaker
Right. And also it's not like the Stones doing exile on Main Street in France. So what we're left with also is the fact that a
00:19:24
Speaker
And a playful altercation happened with a clay sculpture between Glenn and Jules. Glenn injured Jules's finger so much so that he severed a tendon in his left hand during the recording. Oh, happy day. And what happened was Chris Holland came in, excuse me, and helped out with the rest of the piano parts.
00:19:50
Speaker
That's how do you feel about that? I mean, maybe that's where we're missing the missing link. That could be, you know, I just realized that it was Lagos, not Kenya, where all I was trying to figure out, oh, my God, what's going wrong? Yeah, you know, it's true. I mean, there if you're recording an album, you know, I think beyond just the fact that that Jules was physically injured, I found I found an interview with Glenn
00:20:20
Speaker
from, oh gosh, I could tell you exactly when that sort of makes a mention of this. It was from E5 at some point. I think it was after, it was from around when the album came out, so summer. I think it was after they came back from the United States. And he makes reference to Jules
00:20:43
Speaker
Saying, some people have said, Glenn Tilbury admits that cynics could jump to the wrong conclusion. Some quote, some people have said it's because our album didn't do well, and there's a TV personality we can latch onto, that that's why they ended up bringing Jules back into the band. And I wonder if that was sort of in the back of their minds, like, if we just make this a Jules Holland album, then that's not what we're trying to do here. We're trying to reform the band. And if we put Jules 2 up in center, maybe that sort of makes it Jules Holland and the Squeeze. You know what I mean?
00:21:13
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, my understanding, too, was that Jules was kind of sort of finished with the tube. And to put it any other way, he had time on his hands. So they had done a sort of a surprise gig, quote unquote, at the beginning of 1985.
00:21:35
Speaker
And that seemed to work. The chemistry seemed to work. Because, you know, let me get your opinion, Dan. See, there's really been no animosity if we want to talk about Jules. It's not like, oh heavens to Betsy, we hate your piano playing. Get out of the band. Or you've got a major personality problem. How could that happen? And get out of the band and we need a new keyboard player. Let's get Paul Carrick. So now,
00:22:02
Speaker
let me know your feelings. It's a very British thing to sort of be polite and hold back and not say true feelings about the person you're working with, a close person that you're working with, and a friend. But they seem to just get on with it. Am I right? Am I wrong? You mean in this specific era?
00:22:25
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. That's that's it by all accounts and the accounts that I'm reading, or I'm sure the same accounts that you're reading and hearing. And you know, none of us were there. And they don't seem to I
00:22:37
Speaker
I would be very surprised, although it would be pretty awesome if someone went ahead and interviewed them on the cozy period right now. But it does not seem like Jules was any sort of issue. And I think the proof in that is that Jules left that band multiple times and he didn't leave the band after this. And if there was a reason for him to, I'm sure whether he would be asked out or want out, wouldn't it have just happened, right?
00:23:05
Speaker
Yeah, and I mean, I understand the history managerial and business-wise, especially with everything that has to
Squeeze's Comeback Strategy and Production Techniques
00:23:12
Speaker
do with Miles Copeland, and sort of having Jules be more upfront before the split, or before, actually, I'm sorry, beforehand, before Paul Carrick came in.
00:23:25
Speaker
So, you know, there's some business dealings in there. And throughout the years, everybody within the band, without the band, has acknowledged that there's been managerial and business personality clashes. There are no clashes, it seems to me, at any time within the band as far as their contributions to the music. Yes?
00:23:48
Speaker
I agree with you. It seems like Gilson having cleaned up was a big deal and a real positive. Everyone seems to like Keith based on all accounts I've ever seen and heard and read. It seems that Glenn and Chris were sort of having issues that had already began years prior and continued years later, but they're their own little organism, right? I mean, that never seemed to have spilled outside of the two of them.
00:24:17
Speaker
Yeah, it seemed that they've now admitted in their mature years that the lack of communication between the two of them, although was very advantageous when they were younger and their songwriting methods, certainly started to have an effect on their personal relationship as they started to move forward.
00:24:41
Speaker
writing more complex, living slightly different lives. Gee, are we talking about another partnership that has the same problem? No, we're not. So these issues that come along seem to only affect sort of like you say, that outer crust of the sandwich, of Squeeze. And what happens within that, the peanut butter and jelly,
00:25:08
Speaker
Wow, I've never used a food analogy to describe different in Tilbrook, but there you go. That's magnificent. That's magnificent. I could have used anything, but the two of them seem to be okay, although another sort of little crack that happened is with Chris sort of withdrawing and letting the stronger personality, i.e. Glenn Tilbrook, kind of just take over. And like you said, his demos, Glenn's demos from this time period seem to
00:25:37
Speaker
be in that direction. They seem to foreshadow what is going to happen with Cozy. Yeah, that's how I view it. But as we know, Chris wasn't really involved with writing the music until, I mean, wasn't Hourglass the first song they ever sat in the same room and wrote together? Yes, they both did that together. Yep.
00:26:00
Speaker
And you see what happens, so maybe it wasn't a bad idea. I know. Why didn't they think of it sooner? But anyway. So if we talk about another kind of interesting aspect of Cozy, this album comes out in August 1985. So there was this little gig that happened in July on two continents called Live Aid. Where were Squeeze?
00:26:28
Speaker
I've wondered that too. I didn't wonder it at the time because I didn't know. I didn't really know them. But in retrospect, it really is baffling, right? I mean, they were in the midst of a comeback. They were popular enough, right? I mean, and if you look at the lineup, look back at the lineup, of course they would have fit in. They would have fit in perfectly.
00:26:53
Speaker
I'm not to say that there had to be like, they didn't have to have, you know, do they know it's Christmas on the CV, you know what I mean? To sort of be able to, you know, get in the door to live aid. But, you know, even if there was a sort of rejection, oh, we're not right, or we don't have time, I mean, that also could have been, if I'm looking at the timeframe, technically,
00:27:18
Speaker
That's a heavy timeframe for them to be working on a new album and then releasing this new album and for them to go and do gigs. So it might not theoretically have been the best move for them as far as going out and performing. Maybe I'm wrong.
00:27:38
Speaker
Sure, I read somewhere in the last few days, and now I can't remember where. It may have been the song-by-song book, but it may have been in one of their biographies, or it may have been in some store. I don't know. But I didn't Miles have the option to send a band, and he sent Am and the Ants instead.
00:27:58
Speaker
Because why not? Because why not? Because and if I'm right, I mean, I also am in the ants, you know, I love several of their songs, but I feel like 85, they were sort of past their kind of well past their sort of heyday. Although I guess one could already squeeze may have been two for people that didn't realize squeezes even a thing anymore, right? I mean, they hadn't put out a record in three years. So
00:28:20
Speaker
That's why you and I can scream in our heads these doffuses. This is like the biggest stage ever for a band like them to be on because those acts that showed up on the UK side could be very UK. I'm not sure if
00:28:43
Speaker
what Latham was trying to accomplish was to give Cozy a little bit more of a global sound,
Perception of Cozy Fan Tutti Frutti and Laurie Latham's Role
00:28:51
Speaker
whereas a lot of the criticisms are we cannot get over these British-isms. You guys are a pub rock band. Yeah, you had East Side Story, but you're still talking about stuff that people in Lewiston, Maine
00:29:05
Speaker
do not understand or Canton, Ohio. You know what I mean? Sure. That could also be another argument for us to give more love to Cozy if that's where Latham and Tilbrook wanted to place the sound of the album as well. I could see that and you could hear that also on. There are several albums after that where they did get away from
00:29:34
Speaker
their more vintage sound. I mean, I feel like it wasn't until Frank, where with that cleaner sound that they really, and it's a cleaner sound, but it's, I mean, there's almost more American, or an American kind of with Jules' bookie-bookie piano and kind of country-ish elements to that. And then doing play in Los Angeles, although it's not really like a real big LA sound album, but it's, you know, they did move away from that sort of classic English
00:30:04
Speaker
sound, but Chris Difford never got away from his lyrics is the thing. So it's almost like he may as well embrace what you are because Chris is always going to write like he writes. Yeah, I don't think there would ever try to be a deliberate sort of putting a machete through his creative process and saying, you can't write about this and you can't write about that because we cannot relate to it.
00:30:30
Speaker
But there's also fun things too that I felt cozy opened up with that sort of multi-layered, there's sort of a very nice brightness to it. I mean, it could be way too sparkly for the subject matter, but that's what they excel at.
00:30:49
Speaker
is sort of a dark tone versus that sort of peppy melody, which, you know, there's no argument. That's the squeeze sound. It's just that whole production that I think really hangs up a lot of people. However, the band did do Big Bang on the last tour in 2021. I almost did not recognize it. Did you get that at your gig?
00:31:18
Speaker
I did get that in my gig. And it was refreshing and wonderful, and I'm grateful they are embracing, not just that, but all corners of their catalog. I don't want to say they have nothing to lose at this point, but they have nothing to lose at this point. They're going to
00:31:39
Speaker
get the fans in the seats and these are these are real fans in the seats and you know i'm i'm i'm certain when you they have i've seen squeeze i mean i can't literally have lost count between squeeze and glenn tilbrook solo shows and i saw jules once and i saw chris different solo ones you know it's more than 50 times uh among them that whole combination
00:32:05
Speaker
They, see, now I just lost my train of thought. It's the math. It's the math that always throws me off. Just with all those shows, I've never seen them as an opening act. And I'm very grateful for that, because I know that that is the entry to a lot of people is by seeing them open up, having seen them open up for whether it was David Bowie, you know, in the 80s, or Fleetwood Mac in the 90s, or, or whomever.
00:32:30
Speaker
They have so much to draw from. There are only so many singles, right? I mean, how many songs are on 45 and Under? And there are a lot of people that come for those songs, but boy, that still leaves you an hour plus to really pick out those little...
00:32:49
Speaker
gems from all corners. And they've done a good job of that. And, you know, I only wish there was, much as I love all the hits, I'm sure we all wish there was some two and a half hour show of hear songs we've never played live or haven't played live in 20 years or 30 years or whatever it is. And but to hear Big Bang was magnificent. They did Kingbird Street a few years ago, if I remember right, like a slower version of that.
00:33:10
Speaker
Apparently, they did also do King George Street on the first couple of gigs in 2021. Well, I meant post-pandemic when they came back to work with Hall & Oates. But that song was not on my set list here in Florida. Yeah, me neither. I was like three exclamation points in a discussion group. What?
00:33:31
Speaker
They're not you know, I mean obviously for you and me as hardcore fans We could just have the entire show as an opening act be cozy and be absolutely. Oh, yeah happy with that. Oh, yeah And I bet you a lot of people
00:33:50
Speaker
out, a lot of people out there in listener land would say the same thing, even if they don't quite realize it, because these are still sort of classic squeeze songs. And I think that given, you know, we've all been lucky. Oh, I shouldn't say we've all been lucky. We've been lucky that Glenn has had the solo career and has done the solo acoustic stuff and the request shows and things like that, where you really could hear virtually anything. And I think when you get to hear these songs in these different
00:34:19
Speaker
ways. I think there may be a bit of an appreciation and willingness to really go back. And you know, you know, big, big bang, how many people went back and we're like, Oh, big bang, that's not really so bad. Let me let me listen to that again. There has people have to be out there, right? People have to have been out there doing that.
00:34:34
Speaker
Yeah, and the good thing is that it also shows up the fact that even if you're just a casual listener and are put off totally with cozy, we need to remind you that Laurie Latham continues to work. First off, he made contributions to, in 2015, to Cradle to the Grave. He made contributions in 2017 to The Knowledge
00:35:02
Speaker
and he has just worked on Jules' Pianola. So I mean, this is not a situation where we cross him off the list because this is how we feel as fans. We have an issue with this 36 years later with his production. There was an intention for this album to sound the way that it did.
00:35:29
Speaker
That's absolutely right. And, you know, for all the hell say that we give, the collective we give Phil Spector for Let It Be, or give Phil Spector for All Things Must Pass, and how much we love the more organic versions of that whenever we can hear it. He also did a lot of great stuff in the 60s too, right? And if we didn't say,
00:35:57
Speaker
Laurie Latham also did The Knowledge. The Knowledge is one of those really nice, clean, I'm sorry, well, Cradle of the Grave and The Knowledge. But Cradle, especially, is one of those really nice, organic, clean-sounding, old-fashioned squeeze albums, right? I don't think a lot of people would, I think a lot of people would have been surprised to know that he did that and Cozy, because there isn't really any sort of audible connection between the two.
00:36:22
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely, when I found out those tidbits. And it's the thing, too, is that why should you have to search for the connection? You're here to enjoy the entire production of whatever Squeeze is doing at that time.
00:36:37
Speaker
but of course if you are techno geeks like yourself and myself you are absolutely floored to find out that well either technology has caught up finally with the sound that they're looking for or
00:36:55
Speaker
You're just shaking your head and saying, you know what? We're just going to have to accept what cozy is, what cozy was, as far as its sound, and just be happy. Be happy with that.
00:37:11
Speaker
Mm hmm. Well, and these are decisions they made, you know, I've I've often said in regards to I shouldn't say I've often said I've said this before in regards to the Beatles in 69 rejecting the original Glyn Johns mix, which now we have in 2021 2022, I guess.
00:37:30
Speaker
how, you know, in real time, four Beatles rejected that mix. All four of them straight out multiple times did not want that version of Get Back Out. In 1985,
00:37:43
Speaker
all five members of Squeeze, or I don't know if they all had equal votes or whatever it is, but Squeeze all decided this is the album we're putting out. This wasn't the thing where, you know, it got kicked back to the label, the label kicked it back saying, no, we need someone else to come in and remix this or whatever. It was just this was the album they wanted, and that's the album that came out.
00:38:00
Speaker
And I think there is something to be said to be said for that. One of the anecdotes I read somewhere about, I don't remember it, honestly, if it was about cozy, if it was about Babylon, I think it was about cozy. It was a reference to kind of actually, no, actually, I don't remember which one doesn't really matter, because the point is the same. They were trying to cut costs. And
00:38:25
Speaker
Chris Difford, I think it was, said, instead of spending $300 to get a horn section, like live horns, we spent $1,000 to get some computer to do synthesizers. And they made that decision. We may not think it was the best decision. It would have been great to have had a live horn section. But they didn't. And no one enforced that. This wasn't someone producing it.
00:38:54
Speaker
remixing it 30 years later without their knowledge. Yeah. Also, this kind of technology, it's only irks us in many ways because we know where we are going. Yes. That's the super, super hard part to digest. Whereas in 1976, Paul McCartney had to bring a ... How many horns? Five? Four?
00:39:24
Speaker
Oh, for Wings Over America? Yeah, he had to bring a whole entire horn section with him on that tour across the world. Now, he's got wicks.
00:39:35
Speaker
Wix can just do it all and you would never know the difference.
Squeeze's Visual Identity and Music Videos
00:39:39
Speaker
Really, I don't know. It's a good thing, it's a bad thing. I mean, the incarnation of Squeeze today also has the same situation, whereas they could absolutely do Big Bang or something else in that vein and have it sound exactly like that, but apparently,
00:39:57
Speaker
They've got the wherewithal and the good nature and time passing by to say, we're going to do it this way. We're going to do it with the people that we have now on stage.
00:40:10
Speaker
and nobody seems to be complaining, Dan, that I can see. No, you're right. You're right. Now we have seven people. We have an iPad. They have a lot of stuff on stage. They have a lot of gear on stage. It sounds magnificent. Wicked and Cruel. Wicked and Cruel has been one of my favorite Squeeze songs. They played it the very first Squeeze show I saw on the Play Tour in 91, and they played it the last time I saw them, the last several times I've seen them.
00:40:39
Speaker
And it sounds better and better every time I hear it. They've suited... I don't know if they've suited the song to fit the band they have now, or if they've formed the band to suit the way they want to arrange the songs, but whatever combination doesn't really matter, right? Because it sounds fantastic.
00:40:56
Speaker
Yeah, and the other interesting aspect from that time period is as we get to, fortunately, now be able to experience them live and have these cozy songs come back too, we also look back at that time period of 1985 and what was super heavy, like you mentioned, Adam and the Ents,
00:41:14
Speaker
was the visual. And that's been another sort of heavy sigh about Squeeze. There's been no visual connection. And even Chris Difford noted so for Hits of the Year. This was the time of excess, fly the band out to Los Angeles, go with whatever
00:41:37
Speaker
Whatever is happening throw them up in front of a bunch of green screens through all this wacky stock footage in front of them Hey, but do you remember at the very beginning of that video you have? Glen Gilson and is it Jules playing horns?
00:41:56
Speaker
Yes. They're actually playing Saxes at the very beginning of this video. And Jules playing a horn all throughout it. Yeah, exactly. They were all dancing like lunatics. I mean, it's a very funny video in retrospect, right? It's a very funny video in retrospect. It's very, again, talking about things being dated, and it's a very 80s video, right? And I don't know if this is where you want to bring up Glenn's hair or not, if this is a good opening or if you want to save that for later.
00:42:22
Speaker
Oh, I mean, Glenn's hair, hold on, hold on. I gotta suppress a laugh. No, go ahead. Glenn's hair is all over this album. There, I've said it. I'm looking at the back of the sleeve right now. It can't even be contained in that little square. There's still part of his head cut off at the very top. You don't even see it all.
00:42:49
Speaker
Um, Glen's hair could be a separate podcast. And I think you and I have discussed this before this podcast that we need to have two or three other podcasts, probably one of them dedicated solely to the, uh, hairstyles of Glen Tilbrook throughout the years. Um, definitely the look of the band has somewhat polished up in the video. Got to give them credit for that. And that whole sort of mid eighties techno look about it. Um,
00:43:19
Speaker
is kind of appropriate for the subject matter of the song. Now, here's the thing, Dan. Hits of the Year, again, you said at the very beginning, it's about terrorism. This was a big, big thing that was happening at that time period. In fact, there had been a terrorist plane... We're talking plane terrorism. We're here talking about hijackers taking over a plane.
00:43:43
Speaker
flying into another country, et cetera, et cetera. So you've got this very topical subject with a very sort of solid gold approach to it that Chris pretty much dismissed and said, okay, this whole thing is stupid and whatever, it doesn't mean anything. So I guess that's a legitimate gripe, wouldn't you say?
00:44:09
Speaker
Yeah, I think so. I know it's interesting because if you, going back to the demos album, Gwen's demos album, completely different set of lyrics originally from Chris than what we originally ended up having. But it's an odd thing to sing about. It's not like they joked about it. They certainly didn't joke about it, but it's a very whimsical video for something. I mean, imagine like
00:44:32
Speaker
Jeremy by Pearl Jam having like that sort of whimsical video, you know, I mean, or some sort of whimsy to it. And it's just an odd, it was an odd choice, but that's why we love Squeeze. It's a career of odd choices.
00:44:45
Speaker
Right, and of course it made such an impression, and I discovered it a little later on, that of course I'm still talking about it. As well as Last Time Forever. Again, another attempt at them. Correct me now, which was technically the first release? Was it Last Time Forever or Hits of the Year? It was Last Time Forever because I actually have been researching this because I
00:45:13
Speaker
love doing that. I can tell you that it was added to MTV. This is from Billboard. It was added to MTV, I believe the week of August 28. So I don't know if that I don't know if that means it was added on the 21st or if it was added on the 28th, but it was added right around then. So right before the album came out. Good.
00:45:34
Speaker
I was just about to say that that would put it exactly in the time frame of when this album dropped. So they're anticipating, as everybody would back then, that, you know, hello, remember us, squeeze? Ma'am, here we are. Here we are in this video. And, well. And what's the first thing you see? An elderly man mourning the woman that he murdered.
00:46:02
Speaker
Uh, totally appropriate, uh, for reintroducing your favorite pub rock band that you so well remember. Um, not that they were all jolly and happy about the way that black coffee in bed turned out, by the way. Um, yeah, they're, they again suffer from that corporate pushiness that, okay, well, well, you know, but accept it.
00:46:29
Speaker
as well, like, Hey, we're gonna have a fun time, and we're gonna do all this weird stuff. And then, you know, bang, you know, we'll just we'll take take it with what it's worth. I like the video. And I've always liked the video. I had that the first time I saw it, because again, there's no, you know, no, no YouTube, but I had the videos collection VHS. Yes, I heard the 78 to 80. I guess it must have been 78 to 87. Yes, I have that. I have that. Yep.
00:46:53
Speaker
Yeah, and I was exposed to it. When I would watch the whole thing start to finish, it flowed right through. I enjoyed seeing them sort of go through their whole career. Looking at this same, I'm going to preface that or say now, but I'm looking at that same listing from Billboard, from when it was added, all right? The songs, among the songs that were in, quote, heavy rotation on MTV at the time, Take On Me,
00:47:23
Speaker
Money for nothing. Don't lose that number, if you remember that one from Phil Collins.
00:47:29
Speaker
Oh yes, that was hysterical. That was hysterical. It was with the puppets. With the puppets, is that right? Am I thinking of the right one? Or is that one of the different ones? That was Land of Confusion. Land of Confusion, that's right. Okay. Okay. Billy, don't lose my number. That was him basically taking off on a lot of other videos at the time. Yes, yes, yes, yes. And also him, Phil, being sort of very self-deprecating about what the actual video for the song was going to end up being. So yeah, wow.
00:47:53
Speaker
I remember that. Yeah, so that weird science by Ongo Boingo, freedom by WAM. So those were in heavy rotation.
00:48:04
Speaker
But straight away, Take On Me and Money for Nothing. You're talking about two videos that people still talk about 36 and a half years later, right?
Cozy Fan Tutti Frutti's Historical Context and CD Release
00:48:12
Speaker
And they put up Last Time Forever kind of up against, I don't wanna say up against that, because they were all played, but that's the scene that they're in. And I mean, of course it's gonna get like lost and just, it wasn't right. And I was thinking about this earlier today. What if Hourglass was that song? Well, if Hourglass was the reunion song.
00:48:34
Speaker
And what if the Hourglass video was the first video out of that? That would have been like, all right, this fits in, this works. This is a catchy hit song for MTV kind of at the right time. But that's not what happened.
00:48:50
Speaker
I know, and that's an interesting point because videos back then were definitely had their own exclusivity. You had MTV as this promotional marketing channel for bands.
00:49:06
Speaker
And as you noted, and this thing was just like, oh my gosh, this point that I'm about to bring up that you brought up is that this was the first squeeze release as a CD, as a compact disc, which again, back then was brand new technology for a lot of people. So this music was not just analog. This was ones and zeros with your, you know, your headphones, your massive headphones still back then.
00:49:36
Speaker
that was just brought into crystal clear focus. So here we have, again, now we view it like a, you know, I don't know what to say, you know, there's overly synths, whatever, blah, blah, blah, from 85, in this brand new technology that must, again, back then in real time, would have been such a big, big push deal for A&M Records.
00:50:01
Speaker
Yeah, and you're not listening in your car because it was too expensive. I mean, I shouldn't say you're not. Who knows who did. I know we didn't have a CD player in our car for a long time. And you're listening to it on something really nice and new and you don't have 400 CDs yet.
00:50:19
Speaker
You know, it's like if you're buying the CD and it was 20 something dollars because it was certainly, I remember it being a bigger markup than just buying it on vinyl or buying it on cassette. It was, you know, it was special.
00:50:33
Speaker
And it is sort of interesting to kind of, I'm sure the people listening to us remember that. I loved the idea that there's, you know, a 14 year old interested in the history of Cozy Fan 2D Fruity right now. But I would imagine that the people who were storing it, the new Squeeze record on CD. So, it's a long time ago. I mean, you know, you look back 36 and a half years is a long time.
00:51:01
Speaker
It doesn't feel like a long time to those of us who, maybe it does, but it doesn't feel like a long time. The one thing I did do with the math of, we are as far away from cozy as cozy was from 1948, which if you think about that, that seems like a really long time ago.
00:51:24
Speaker
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00:51:53
Speaker
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00:52:01
Speaker
Well, Dan, that kind of math absolutely floors me, especially when you think about when we do those kind of mathematical equations, wouldn't you say? When you tend to look at something from, I don't know, in our case, it would be like World War II, post-World War II. And a lot of things that came up, especially like, say, with the Get Back documentary, people say, oh my God, that's 50 years ago, but it's amazing.
00:52:29
Speaker
And we, but we still can't use that as an excuse, you know, to say, well, you know, all of that happened. And even Glenn has said, I went back and actually did some reading and said, you know, well, it's fashionable to trash Lori Latham. But yeah, they, like you said, everybody agreed that this is what the album is going to sound like. So that, you know, nobody should be arguing about it. I found an interview with
00:52:56
Speaker
Chris from, where is this? It's dated September 14th, 1985. So it had come out. I mean, I don't know what the street date of the magazine would have been. But, you know, it goes he had just come out and Chris says, I known him for years. He's a very nice chap. This is about Lori Latham. He's a very methodical worker. He seems to know how to get the best out of individuals. And then it says this is the
00:53:19
Speaker
the writer, the Latham Hallmark touches, orchestral stabs, and hyper twanging bass lines are all there on Tutti Frutti. And then Chris jumps in and says something similar to which I had said earlier. But you can say that if you work with Phil Spector, you'd expect to have some of his trademarks on your record. Everybody had so much confidence in Laurie that people went away when he mixed the album. So, I mean, at the moment, I mean, they were not just on board. They were embracing him. They wanted this.
00:53:49
Speaker
Yeah, the accolades just seem to pour forth from everybody within the band. I mean, aside from how we continue to harp on the datedness of the sound, you have to admit that, and the darker content that's contained within the album. Generally, overall, we should really
00:54:11
Speaker
approach it from that perspective now in this day and age. Because if we're willing to accept, like we've mentioned before, albums and releases from that period and not make fun of it or eye roll it, then we should be able to say, hey, squeeze as a band did this at this time and we're glad they did, if I may say.
00:54:37
Speaker
Oh, for sure. And, you know, think about, I mean, it came from the right place. If you're reuniting and you're trying to make a splash, I mean, think of the success that Lori Latham had just had with Paul Young. I mean, it was a lot and it was over, you know, more than one album over several years. It wasn't like someone without a pedigree that they turned to.
00:55:00
Speaker
Yeah, and I agree with that as well because even though Paul was recording a Darrell Hall song, which wasn't new, let's face it, and I have heard Darrell's original, his own version, his original version of it.
00:55:16
Speaker
Paul's just that type of singer. So for Laurie to do the production that he did on it obviously worked. I saw the concert from 1986, The Prince's Trust, where Paul was very front and center and sang. He just has that great soulfulness to him.
00:55:37
Speaker
And I have to admit, I mean, give me your opinion. I mean, he's got, I think, a much deeper soul than if Laurie's intention was to do that with Glenn. I think he succeeded better with Paul Young. I agree. I mean, we love Glenn. I mean, Glenn's voice is... I mean, it's the greatest thing there is, right? But that's not really what he does. I mean, he didn't... When Elvis Costello had...
00:56:08
Speaker
Look, we love when Glenn sings Tempted, but when Elvis Costello had Paul Carrick sing it on the album, that was the right choice, right? And Glenn agreed. Yeah, exactly. Exactly.
00:56:21
Speaker
But the other thing is, too, that we can have our sort of nitpicky moments with Cozy. I would have to say, now that we've been effusive in our praise, that I think my one kind of, the term I like to use, somebody else I know who does a podcast on the Beatles calls it the skipper, is I learned how to pray.
00:56:47
Speaker
I personally like it. It has odd memories for me. I shouldn't say odd memories. It has specific memories. I mentioned earlier something like, I learned how to pray, break my heart. It's like I was 16, 17 in high school when I first got this album. It very much hit that sort of, oh, I had a bad day. And I'm just going to palm my headphones and listen to that. So there's something about it that I do like that touches me. But I also feel that way about,
00:57:17
Speaker
by your side. I'm not a fan of by your side. That's that's one which I skip. But I know that's one which is beloved by a lot of people. And you know, around and about closes, you know, the encore is by your side. And I'm like, Oh, that's that's how they close this show. They can't close this show with by your side. But that's but I know that's me. And I'm sure there are people skipping over me right now. So
00:57:38
Speaker
Well, I would say that the sequence of songs is pleasing from at least a track by track. As we noted before, to have Big Bang open up with Keith and Gilson. So then let's skip over a couple of things and talk about that last song on the album, I Won't Ever Go Drinking Again.
00:58:00
Speaker
As I noted to you, the interesting part is to be able to see them perform the song. So they did that on this show called The Cutting Edge. And again, we'll make fun of Glenn's hair for the moment. We'll note it.
00:58:15
Speaker
But it's a very interesting series that happened and it was all due to Miles Copeland because he was presenting it from a label standpoint, which is his label IRS records. And he was back in the good graces of Squeeze. So this little bit of Jules, Glenn and Chris doing it somewhat acoustically with a lot of fake smoke, I think it was, correct me if I'm wrong, helped to sell the song a little bit.
00:58:46
Speaker
Yeah, it's a weird scene with like, it's like they're, I don't want to say like an antique shop type thing, but this weird set up with odd puppets and it actually kind of looks like Glenn's studio now that sometimes he records from, you know, with with all these weird, weird things kind of around. I don't know how else to describe it. You have to basically see it. This this is that is my favorite song on this record. That is one of my favorite sweet songs from the first time I ever heard it and never experienced it to
00:59:14
Speaker
I mean, this very moment, it's one of my favorite Chris Difford lyrics, if not my favorite for just how, I mean, perfect, how perfectly he describes a hangover in a way that is identifiable. There's so many squeeze lyrics, which I just can't and couldn't relate to. And this one is, I mean, it is perfect. To have the title of the song end in the question mark is genius. It's delivered perfectly. The music, I mean, everything about the song,
00:59:42
Speaker
A plus. And that clip on on MTV, I found that, again, a few years later, I mean, this was probably 85, 85, I guess 85, probably when they were in the United States, I would think they filmed it as opposed to sometimes 86. Do we know when it's actually from?
01:00:00
Speaker
I'm going to guess it's from 85 because in the research that I've done, the early incarnation of the cutting edge, which was a series and I purchased this on a VHS tape.
01:00:15
Speaker
My brother had a copy of the tape. My brother had a copy of the tape.
01:00:34
Speaker
at this point. So I look at it and probably you do too, a little bit out of context. I'm sure if I put this up there in the podcast and ask people are there more specific British memories or US memories of this as a show, we might get some interesting feedback.
01:00:53
Speaker
Yeah, it's like I said, my brother had a copy of this on VHS. He was a few years older. He was a Husker Du fan. And I think that's why he bought the cassette. Because I think Husker Du or the smithereens or someone like that were was on that tape also. And then he went off to college and left the tape and I
01:01:11
Speaker
Walked in his bedroom and found the tape and I'm like wait a second squeezes on this too This is around when I was again getting into them. So it was a perfect. It's still I mean, it's still a it's still a funny It's still a very funny clip and that's the other thing about I won't be ever go drinking again. It's sort of the light it fun The album finally gets light and even though it's singing about you know, I hang over it said and it's it's written in such a
01:01:35
Speaker
humorous, I don't even know if it's humorous, but such honest ways that kind of will make you smile and laugh. And then that clip is so funny and they're having so much fun. And it's something which you don't really see much of or hear much of until you get to that last track on the record.
01:01:52
Speaker
And the fact that they can deliberately put the whole thing almost out of tune with Glenn's strumming and all that and all this kind of like moaning and chanting background vocals is pretty much spot on. So you're right. After everything we've endured with murders and Jack Nicholson snippets, we can get something that's a little bit lighter. Go figure.
01:02:21
Speaker
And this is Squeezu up until that point. I mean, there is a lot of humor in those lyrics, and certainly live. It's not like live they were. I mean, I know we were going to talk about the subsequent tour, or certainly the American tour, which you saw. I mean, they're such a fun
01:02:41
Speaker
enjoyable, funny band. And on this record, you didn't really get that until that very end. As a reminder. Yeah, no, no, no, no, I totally understand that because there seemed to be like that sort of overburdened
01:02:57
Speaker
As Rolling Stone noted, we've got these blue and gray 10-hour miniseries kind of stuff going on. To throw this one in there to end it, that was just kind of like the cherry on top of the tutti frutti, so to speak. Yes.
01:03:15
Speaker
But noted as humor before we touch base in the tour that was upcoming are the B-sides. This was a time period when vinyl was still happening. They had 7-inch releases as a 45, but you also had 12-inch releases that were extended. Either they were extended mixes or they just had more on the B-side. I noted that personally a couple of years later, but
01:03:43
Speaker
For purposes of humor, we could probably spend another podcast, but we will, we will hold back. We will reign this sin for the B side that is on last time forever. And it is Dan. Oh, B side last time forever. Sweets from five strangers.
01:04:00
Speaker
Yeah. So in your inimitable, perky manner, how would you describe this? What is this? It is so far removed from the album. It's like nothing else they've done, right? I mean, it's such a, again, it's to stir it off. So it's five, basically one minute-ish. Maybe it's a little bit less. I don't even know. Unrelated.
01:04:29
Speaker
not really connected, vignettes, I don't even know if that's the right way to put it. It's five, five short songs done solo by each of the members. And it's almost like, I mean, the the the I'm trying to think of an analogy that that, you know, in our world, do we say it's like the Beatles Christmas records, but it's not kind of holiday.
01:04:55
Speaker
I don't even know how to describe it. Jules is a comedy number, but it's a song. And then you have three instrumentals, you have Christopher, I mean, how do you describe this?
01:05:16
Speaker
How do you describe Chris Diffords, the practicing clarinet? Wow. First of all, refresh my memory. Does it actually have a clarinet in it? I don't think it does. I don't think it does. I remember listening to it yesterday or two days ago, and I don't think it does. Jules Hollins does mention, it is the first mention of penis in a squee song, if I'm correct.
01:05:40
Speaker
Yes, and in fact, Penis and Mixing Board, a recording console, and Walkman, all in less than a minute, with also a hearing test thrown in for lovely listeners, is SoJules, So 1985. Oh, it's amazing. It's amazing. Go ahead. No, no, no, no. What can you say? What can you say to that?
01:06:07
Speaker
I don't know. I think I just pretty much described a song. But the other interesting part is, I think, not surprisingly, the most musical piece is Glenn's. Yes. Speedy Goes to Tobago.
01:06:23
Speaker
which sounds like what it is. You know, sort of Jamaican, Caribbean kind of instrumental mixed in with a bunch of, I don't know, it's very quick and fast. And it's probably just, again, like all of these are pretty much of a throwaway, but you can tell that Glenn spent a little bit of time on it.
01:06:43
Speaker
Oh, yeah, the hums kind of is the the vocals almost like a hum kind of thing. It's lovely. Like I would listen to three and a half minutes of that. I'd listen to an album of that, you know. Right. Now, could you listen to an album's worth of keys? Ah,
01:07:02
Speaker
I don't know. Not an album's worth. I mean, a minute was fine. A few minutes are fine. And I don't think that's any anything. It's not necessarily anti Keith. Maybe I'm just more pro Jules and Glenn.
01:07:16
Speaker
I would say for Gilson, for what his bit is, which is mostly drums, that's acceptable, and it's nice to have that. With Keith, I wasn't quite expecting it to be amazingly just sound effects of car horns and pinball machines. Again, there could be something else going on there that we weren't aware of in the studio, but for a gentleman who is basically a virtuoso on the fretless bass,
01:07:46
Speaker
That was quite when an asterisk different. Oh, yeah. No, it was different. And it was neat to have all of these different things. And again, just to show sort of
01:07:59
Speaker
It's almost, again, I mean, literally the flip side of this song about murder. You have, you know, it's playing pinball and it's everything is whimsy on the other side. And it's it's fun. It's I'm glad this document exists for whatever it's documenting. It's it's there and we have it. So.
01:08:20
Speaker
Yeah, it's not a bad thing. We just like to make fun of it because, well, we can. But the other b-side that comes up is called Fortnite Saga, or SAGA, wherever part of the country you live in.
01:08:35
Speaker
To me, this probably shows off the most lethal version of what synthesizers were capable of doing. It had a storyline that was typical Chris. However, it was very, to use a British term, very twee in its arrangement. And it just seemed to be composed on a Casio, whatever they called those Casio keyboards back then.
01:09:05
Speaker
Agree, disagree, have an opinion on it. I've always loved this song.
01:09:16
Speaker
in my mind, and this could be because I had it on an old cassette I bought at a record show, you know, or something like that, back to back with what the Butler saw. And I always associated those two songs together. And I always wondered, what if it had kind of the full orchestral arrangement that that song did? How would that have changed?
01:09:37
Speaker
Fortnite Saga, which, like you said, sounds like the demo that I think Glenn described it as almost. It was very hastily recorded, and it doesn't sound like a song, like a completed song should. But I love it. I mean, it sounds great. It's short. It's a neat little pop song. But like I said, Tweed's a terrific description of it. I like that. That does nail it.
01:10:03
Speaker
Well, it's the only way to describe, you know, those type of keyboards that you could buy for like a hundred bucks at your local record store kind of or music shop, as it were. And then but for for a band like that, I think it kind of threw people maybe a little bit because the the song is again one of those sort of darker, you know, there's domestic troubles, but the kids are portrayed as the kids are like innocent or, you know, there's a whole bunch of different meanings that can be associated with it.
01:10:32
Speaker
So you love Chris, but this arrangement and the accompaniment and the music, you know, the music mentation of it kind of falls for me. So with it.
01:10:43
Speaker
Yeah, it's something I've wished would have happened, and this is sort of comes on the heels of the cutting edge discussion. We've been lucky to have the Difford and Tilbrook shows. Over the course of 30-something years, we have the just Chris and just, I mean, Chris Difford and Glenn Tilbrook shows, not necessarily Difford and Tilbrook, right? So just the two of them. So it would have been wonderful to have had, at some point in time, the Chris-Glenn Jules show.
01:11:12
Speaker
acoustic, jewels on piano, no keyboard, no organ, no whatever, maybe organ. But to have songs like that, you know, we had that in that cutting edge clip. What if we had an hour and a half of that, or an album of that? And I think that could have presented a lot of these songs in an interesting, compelling way.
01:11:34
Speaker
Well, this this begets, as we always continue to say, another podcast. Yes. Chris and Glenn did the inaugural MTV Unplugged. Yes.
01:11:47
Speaker
So that was around that time when they were in promotion, I think, of Frank. So we're getting a little bit ahead of ourselves maybe at the time. So there are sort of visual slash recorded versions of them presenting themselves as more of a stripped down. And if I recall, that was quite a nice aside. But Jules,
01:12:12
Speaker
has such a dominant personality, as we've discussed before, that to have him come back into cozy worked, and it didn't work, because he did end up being one of the band again. And for me, that was kind of nice. But another b-side that shows up is Love's Crashing Waves, which is a different until Brooke song, technically.
01:12:39
Speaker
that they chose from the Boston gig in August of 85. So I heard that and it's felt like 95% of the show was Jules Compierre, you know. And the funny thing is, I'd like to call out the fact that it was presented as a live broadcast on the rock station, the rock station from Boston, WBCN.
01:13:05
Speaker
So they were hyper aware of this fact that it was being broadcast, which was a big thing back then. But they did a standout job on that song. And again, like you say, better to have it than not with all its weird technicalities and overproduction on the D&T album itself. And they played it quite a bit if I'm not mistaken.
01:13:26
Speaker
Mm hmm. I seem to recall that. And it's, you know, we've heard that still, still over the years, and we still get loves crashing waves, every, every tour, every other tour. And it's, you know, certainly been integrated. And it's never, they never really changed the
01:13:42
Speaker
the arrangement and on this version that's beside of King George Street, right? Yep, I'm looking at it right here. It was basically, you hear a little bit more of Jules on piano kind of near the beginning, but it's again, a spirited version. It's a little bit faster paced, I think, than the album version, but it's still kind of bathed in
01:14:05
Speaker
in synthesizers and or a synthesized orchestration I should say but that's fine you know it fits it's it's a great song and and and and and it kind of reminds I would assume that road would remind
01:14:19
Speaker
whatever, you know, if they're, if, if the reunion is the thing they're trying to kind of celebrate, then it just reminds people that, hey, you know, we're still, this is, this is part of us. We're, we're, we're different Tilburg are squeeze. We're moving along. We're all incorporating that history now into this and, and moving forward. So while looking backwards.
01:14:38
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. Because they eventually did do a full blown tour. I found a lot of funny things about the way they presented themselves. They come across as so serious on a lot of the photographs and images that you see, especially on the back of the album. And, you know, first off, Kaze Fan Tutti Frutti, which is supposed to be, I'm guessing, I haven't heard confirmation, basically, it's a take off on the Mozart play. Yes.
01:15:08
Speaker
I could read you a quote from that same record mirror story from September 14th. Okay, this is again, Christopher. That came from me. I was reading The Times one day and I saw a review of Cozy Fan 2 Day, I don't know if I'm even pronouncing that right, which seemed to be this thing that I'd always read about and never really bothered to find out what it was all about.
01:15:32
Speaker
So I went out and bought it, thought it was quite interesting, but at the same time I was also reading a book on Little Richard. The recent biography by Charles White, which by the way is really crazy. I don't know if you've ever read the Little Richard autobiography. It's insane. Anyway, that was me. That was not cruciferous. But he does go on to say, read the book on Little Richard, which is quite dirty in parts, and I just put the two together. So
01:15:57
Speaker
There we go. As Chris would. Yes. And the cover artwork. Again, another sticking point that we could continue on and on and on about. We could babble on and on about the fact that the band obviously suffers and has suffered and we can't correct it for whatever reason.
01:16:19
Speaker
sort of a brand identity issue. So you have no picture of the band on the front cover, except a cozy, which is that covering on a tea kettle, a Japanese Asian fan. And then you have Tutti Frutti, which is like this gelatinous gelato thing with wafers in it. And like three, three little spotlights on it. So
01:16:44
Speaker
If you approach it from that perspective, first off, I would have gone, what? I have this on both CD and vinyl. The CD, we talked about how that was kind of a big deal, was the first squeeze CD. But I would imagine that at that time, it still probably sold more vinyl, right? The image is so dominant on this thing. And the word squeeze on top is so small.
01:17:14
Speaker
And Cozy Fan Tutti Frutti on the bottom is so small. I couldn't imagine that if you walked into a record store and didn't know what this was, you would have any clue after that what this was. It's impossible. I mean, it really is impossible to see the word squeeze on the cover of the cell. And for a band who's reuniting and trying to have people remember who they were, that's, again, sort of seems very on brand for them to make it hard for the audience.
01:17:44
Speaker
Yeah, and we have to accept this because now that we can talk about, you know, in hindsight, we look at the next two releases, and again, no band cover that, you know, features them on the front. So, we have a guy who's, you know, this sort of distorted face on cover of Babylon and Odd Blood, then you have a, you know, a tortoise. So, okay, so we can't argue about that.
01:18:08
Speaker
But the same thing, same thing, same thing with 45s and under, too. I mean, you have their, you know, their greatest achievements still to this day, or they're, I'm assuming their greatest selling thing to this day. And, you know, where are they? It's I mean, it's it's the cartoon. So
01:18:24
Speaker
And, you know, I mean, you and I can speak to the fact of being, you know, such devoted followers that we know that it's about the music, you know, it's not about an image. And I understand at the time in 85 that it was all about the image, especially when you look at at least the two videos, the way they've sort of smartened up, gotten some really nice threads going.
01:18:51
Speaker
have tried to fit in to that whole upscale, sort of, well, okay, I'm going to go there, Miami Vice look that. You're right. Hopefully, I've got my demographics listening. Their ears have just broke up. They worked.
01:19:17
Speaker
They were too off point. And in the stage show, they really weren't trying to oversell, like sometimes that happens in a live concert situation, where do we place the new stuff so that people don't end up leaving their seats and going to the bathroom?
01:19:40
Speaker
And that certainly was on course for the changes, I believe, probably that were to come. They probably felt, okay, we're comfortable presenting this material wrapped in singles, 45s and under. If you would kind of comment on that, I would, yes, probably. Yeah. Oh, you mean since then, kind of for the remainder of their career, you mean?
01:20:07
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah, I think so. I mean, along with I mean, I think they're they're very aware of how I look maybe there's a podcast right now a you know.
01:20:17
Speaker
of some other contemporary band where they're having the same conversation, how Squeeze and their fans have such a unique bond, right? I mean, we see it when we're amongst ourselves, when we're talking online, when we're talking offline, when we're at a concert, when we're seeing, you know, we're here in the United States, but we know that in England, they have that same sort of relationship probably around the world, right? And, you know, we
01:20:42
Speaker
We know that they are aware of what we want to hear, and they will play in 2021 Big Bang on their show. They'll open up with footprints. They'll play album tracks. They'll play the singles. They'll play things you don't expect. They'll occasionally throw in the odd cover here and there every several years, whatever it is. I think they know what we want, and I think they know that we would take the new stuff. But I also think they know that maybe we're taking our friend to the show, and they know, pulling muscles from Michelle,
01:21:12
Speaker
and nothing else. And I think there's sort of that give and take and kind of giving us all those things. I would agree because a lot of that does focus on some pacing as any concert situation would nowadays with their technology. But I mean, back then, they were also working with a lot of sort of quote unquote new technology.
01:21:40
Speaker
And with the synthesizers and the drum machines and sort of the vocal, well, for want of a better word, like, you know, auto tuning, which how in the heck could that even happen with somebody like Glenn? But maybe with Jules, you know, it's kind of mind blowing to think that that can still, we can still look at that and feel like, hey, it is kind of contemporary.
01:22:07
Speaker
in many aspects. So there. So anyway, we tend to look at Cozy in hindsight. We tend to want to couch it and say, we're going to put it in its place because of the technology, because of the production.
01:22:34
Speaker
And I sort of wanted you to kind of, you know, however you want to describe it for yourself, where you think cozy fits in today. How can we give it more love besides saying, okay, there's the odd thing going on with lyrics or this happened and that happened with hindsight and
01:22:57
Speaker
you know, not give it not make it an excuse to really embrace it as part of Squeeze history and not have it be that one that that stands out so much for its differences. I almost feel like we have to think of it. And again, going back to our our world of the Beatles, we almost have to think of it like the way that we heard about
01:23:24
Speaker
whether it's Let It Be or whether it's Ram by Paul McCartney, right? Where you've heard, Ram was out before I was born. And Let It Be was out before I was born. And the first time I was ever kind of getting into music, there was already the established, oh, well, this one's Paul's worst. I mean, it's out there, everyone hated it. And like, Let It Be, all of them trashed Let It Be. It's the winter of discontent. They all hated the sessions.
01:23:50
Speaker
And it really took, I mean, for something like RAM, it took 30 years for people to kind of revisit it.
01:24:00
Speaker
and start saying, oh no, this is, let's listen to the fresh ears. And God, it's taken, let it be 50 years for people to really kind of give it a different look at least at that era. And I think it's human nature to be like, I've been told this and you sort of absorb it. And I'm not saying that if people on their own don't like the sound of it, then they're wrong. It's whatever you like is whatever you like, whenever you don't is whatever you don't. But I think that if you kind of allow yourself to sort of
Reassessing Cozy Fan Tutti Frutti's Legacy
01:24:29
Speaker
shed that. It makes it easier. I listened to cozy about, I don't know, a week ago, 10 days ago for the first time in spec straight through first time put on my headphones and just listen to it to listen to it for the first time in a long time.
01:24:43
Speaker
And they sounded like explosive. And I kind of forced myself to not not I mean, I knew I knew what song went into the next song. I know this album so well as squeeze is my favorite, favorite active band, right? And they've been for a long, for a long, long, long time. And it I think if you if you kind of allow your own biases to kind of let go and just
01:25:08
Speaker
Think of it from that baseline and not, this is the 85 album, this is the reunion album, this is all the different things we've discussed. If you just listen to it like it's just another Squeeze album, it maybe does sorta fit in. And, you know, I'm not someone who really likes, I wanna say new wave music, but there's a lot of peers of this record by other artists that like, I don't particularly like, I will,
01:25:35
Speaker
I like Squeeze and I kind of view it in that whole as opposed to this is an album of this kind. Does that make any sense?
01:25:49
Speaker
It does because as we've noted, and I think we've made the argument, if we can embrace that time period for what it was, and like we tend to do with history as far as we'll be specific, music is concerned, we can't trash disco anymore. We just can't.
01:26:13
Speaker
uh you could back then it was it was in vogue um and i know that a lot of the concerns that we bring up about cozy are somewhat genuine because it's almost like we're concerned we're so concerned for these guys why are they doing this to themselves why are they making these videos you know because we know that's that's not like them
01:26:39
Speaker
And we know that there's a sense of humor, but also having the hindsight of autobiographies and recollections, we now know what they were going through, what Glenn and Chris were going through.
01:26:54
Speaker
what the band was going through. So there shouldn't be any real sort of downturn on this as far as where it stands in Squeeze history. We should embrace it and not automatically, as you've noted too as well, sort of like in a message to me that
01:27:15
Speaker
People should try and do it chronologically. Everybody will hang everything on singles 45s and under. For God's sakes, that's four years, four years of the band in a very, very, very tight space. Now, we're talking about something that came right after that, and we're still talking about that. What was the math on that, Dan? 36 years? 36 and a half.
01:27:41
Speaker
Yeah, so there shouldn't be any real reason why this album should, first of all, not stand alone and also have its place in line with Squeeze history, but not have it judged before and after. It should be on its own and see where it was and appreciate the fact that if everybody said okay, then it was kind of okay and there were no hard feelings.
01:28:11
Speaker
Yeah, and you know, speaking of the biases, I wrote this down, but I didn't mention it in that rant a few minutes ago. On, you know, so, singles of singles, singles came before Cozy. Since then, they've had, I mean, five, six different compilations that they have, that they basically have assembled themselves. I mean, it says on here, either this compilation produced by Christopher and Glenn Silverick, or, you know, collected by different Silverick, whatever it is. And I went through them. And 92, you have Squeeze's Greatest Hits.
01:28:39
Speaker
Squeeze's Grace Hits has, oh, I have the page up here. Squeeze's Grace Hits has 20 songs. Three of them are from Cozy, which is, you know, that was in line with Lava the Records. Then you go to, where am I, 96, excess moderation, and that has
01:29:01
Speaker
of 40 songs. I'm holding this up here and I'm counting of 40 songs. It has a grand total of one song of Cozy. Now that also had some B-sides mixed in. But one song representing that whole album out of 40 on two discs. The Big Squeeze came out in 2002. That has on, oh, that's that one I have right here. That one of 19, I'm sorry, 39 songs. And this was more of a strict race.
01:29:31
Speaker
Although, oh no, I take it back. That had one side that was album track, one side that was B-sides. That had Last Time Forever only, and it did have Fortnite Saga. Again, two songs out of 39. And then finally, if people are still there and haven't shut me off, there is the Essential Squeeze from 2007. That, out of 20 songs,
01:29:59
Speaker
had last time forever, had just won. So they themselves have sort of minimized the record over the course of time. And again, what kind of message are you supposed to get as a fan if it's like, well, they're the ones, you know, not talking about it. They're the ones not promoting it. So they must not want us to hear it. They must not be proud of it. It must not be a thing. So, you know, again, you sort of have to, like you said, just like we both said, just free yourself and place it in its own place in history and kind of take it from there.
01:30:28
Speaker
and appreciate the fact that they're still here and that they do want to perform what we thought were unperformable songs that meet the technology of today. Well, I mean, we must be living in an alternate universe, Dan, because they had the foresight to see that these songs could be performed 36 years later and they actually sound better. They do. No, they really do.
01:30:59
Speaker
I mean, these are the songs as they wrote them. I mean, obviously, there's a little bit of a different arrangement. But like you said, the technology gets them here now and whatever it takes, if they're willing to embrace these songs now, you know, that last that last compilation I cited was from 2007. So we already talking 15 years ago. Since then, we've heard King George Street Live and we've heard Big Bang Live. And, you know, that's if they're going to if they're if they're willing to reassess it themselves, then I think we all should as well.
01:31:26
Speaker
Well put. Thank you. That's well put. In as few words as possible, I think Chris Difford would be proud. When I get the cease and desist, I'll let you know if that's actually true.
01:31:41
Speaker
No, I think, Chris, in his mature wisdom these days has definitely looked upon and blessed you many, many years ago and understands that you are part of the elder atmosphere of Squeeze fans and should be revered as such. So, Dan, thank you so, so much for your insight on Cose Fan Tutte Frute.
01:32:08
Speaker
I hope that we've given a lot of people out there reason to believe in this release. Listen to it. Laugh a little bit. Go out to your local record store. Pick up those extended vinyls. Give us your feedback on Sweets from Five Strangers because that's why we're here. We're here to listen to that, aren't we?
01:32:33
Speaker
We are. Thank you so much for asking me. This was fantastic. I mean, there's nothing, there's nothing greater than talking about Squeeze. So it's, it's fun we got to do it. I look forward to doing it again.