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Marcus Berkmann
EverYrecord collection has them. They are the Cool Records That No One Actually Listens To. Many of them are among rock's acknowledged classics, and yet, whenever you are wondering which great record to play next, it's always something else that you choose. You keep them because you hope that merely owning such records says something about you. What it actually says is that it's time you took these records down to the secondhand shop, but few of us are bold enough to confront such uncomfortable truths. So we keep them for ever and they gather dust and mysterious fingermarks, until rediscovered by younger relatives and roundly mocked. For even the coolest records cannot remain cool for ever. Even Trout Mask Replica will be widely recognised as pretentious bilge one day. At least, so we must hope.
Having chanced upon a shamefully brief list of such records in Q magazine — which included Captain Beefheart's aforementioned masterpiece and Lambchop's courageously dull Is A Woman — I threw the debate open to Spectator readers, who turned out to be as magnificently opinionated as you might expect. I had 60 emails, most of them closely argued and several very funny indeed. We probably all love completely different music, for that's the pleasure of it: the breadth and depth of pop music know no bounds. But I think it's remarkable how much of the same music really cheeses us off. The same names crop up again and again. The Velvet Underground. The Clash. Primal Scream. Van Morrison. Prince. Mike Oldfield. (Was he ever cool? Even for 20 minutes in 1973?) Slightly more surprisingly, Nick Drake. Wholly satisfyingly, Coldplay. The more people are told what they should be listening to, the less they want to listen to it.
Six albums receive four or more votes. Miles Davis's Bitches Brew is 'the definitive vision of jazz-rock' according to the Rolling Stone Record Guide and unlistenable tripe according to Spectator readers. 'It irritates me the moment the needle hits the record,' says Henry Jeffreys. 'Absolute groundbreaker but only two listens in 30 years,' says Tony Pearson. I have a jazz friend who says it's for people who don't like jazz — which shows you how well he understands people who don't like jazz. From a similar era comes The Velvet Underground & Nico. 'When I was a student it graced every record collection, yet nobody ever played it,' says David Humphries. 'At least, not past "Heroin", after which it dissolves into "The Black Angel's Death Song" and "European Son"? Funnily enough, those song titles instantly evoke for me the almost infinite boredom of that record, which has inspired generations of starving indie rockers who only wear black, the poor lambs. The Velvet Undergound & Nico just shaded White Light/White Heat and Lou Reed's famously cynical Metal Machine Music, which was four sides of white noise recorded purely to annoy his record company. And anyone who made the mistake of buying it. Some readers have never forgiven him.
The biggest surprise of the six is the Clash's London Calling. In the Observer's recent list of 100 Great British albums, it came third. But no one actually listens to it, says Bryn Mills. 'consisting as it does of a reasonably catchy title track and about three hours of tuneless grey skiffte'. I like that description so much I want to frame it. Sandinista!, their famously boring triple album, was nominated only twice, but it may be that fewer people bought it after the wild tedium of London Calling. Double albums, it seems, have much to answer for. The Stones's Exile On Main Street attracts particular opprobrium. 'Too many interchangeable songs, some little more than a couple of verses and some muddy guitar licking; tunes inadequately developed; titles slapped down after a moment's thought; sludgy production; indecipherable vocals,' says Charles Ramsden. Exile came eighth on the Observer's list. Another of our hetes noires, The Beatles' White Album, came sixth. People have good reasons to listen to Abbey Road or Revolver or Sgt Pepper — they are jam-packed with wonderful songs. And the White Album? Well, what a splendid cover.
You can be annoyed by all this if you wish. But bear in mind that that's the idea.
There is an outright winner, with nine votes. Radiohead split the listening public with their prog-rock epic OK Computer, but they laid waste to it with scythes when Kid A came out. All those bloops and bleeps, a grave shortage of rousing guitars and an absolute dearth of tunes. Millions bought it; few play it. And every time a critic tells us it's a work of genius, we find ourselves grinding our teeth down to stumps. Thanks for all the emails. The small prize previously mentioned (a CD) goes to Charles Ramsden for his splendid demolition of Exile On Main Street. Rest assured, Charles, it won't be Kid A.
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