lost in music

howdy pop pickers

and so another bourgeois, indulgent slice of consumerism, look you see. which would be to say yes, i have gone done bought another musical excursion in a compact disc format. or compact discs, for, or as, the set what i have most recently purchased takes the shape of four (4) discs, housed in a rudimentary basic case thing that just about meets minimum requirements. 

over the last few years (truly i forget how many, perhaps now two or three) some of you regular readers will have given a moment to glance at my observations concerning the CD (which is the common way to refer to compact disc, but also yes a cross dresser) issues (or re-issues) of the first few volumes of compilations called Now That's What I Call Music. for clarity, the original (or initial) UK versions of such, as in different nations the sequence of numbers (and track selections) differ considerably. it is not so that them what do the Now series limit themselves to this. presumably so as to seek money they issue a rather formidable number of themed compilations, all of a title which commences with the words Now That's What I Call. 

usually, normally and very much as a standard i generally do not bother with these sets. for the most part they comprise of things that i have and have no wish for further copies, or are filled with songs that i assume the lure (or attraction) is that they are cheap to licence. such a shun was not to be with the most recent of these items, for it had immediate appeal. 

so much can be associated with, and spoken of, 80s music that it is impossible to give one precise such thing the title of being a definitive representation. but for us, them what grew up (for the most part) within that decade and fell in love with music, the 12" single holds a huge part of any aspect of the heart which has a string to be pulled by the decade. of this, then, putting out a set dedicated to some of the 12" singles of the time (albeit just the "A" side, or the business end if you like) was always quite likely to be an immediate purchase for some, especially me. 

to go non non-linear, it was even so that i (moi) was able to buy it on the day of release. for purposes of provenance, it was from a Tesco in a province of far distance. the price paid for this was a most agreeable £10, which was just fine as i had seen pricing some way north of this indicated. so as to give some indication of this, i believe there were a few retailers who proposed to command a cost of either £12 or £15 for this. that costing might have made me pause, but £10 was autopilot. when one considers that, back in the 80s, just one (1) 12" single would have cost a pop fan such as i either £2.49 or even as much as 1p south of £3, well, there is how music has been devalued by the modern world. 

you are no doubt (possibly if not potentially) interested in the track listing, so below is an almost not too blurry image of the back. indeed, on a cursory glance, my magpie eyes rather honed in on the shiny ones which were of appeal in this regard, disregarding the fact that several tracks on it are not ones i would have no general wish to be in my collection. 

perhaps some historical observations, or points, are appropriate here. others shall have recorded this in a much more better way than i, but here we are. the twelve inch single did exist in the 70s, but truly came into its own in the 80s. a bargain was struck between record labels and fans, albeit in a tacit way but all the same one which was win-win. many of us fans bought the 12" of singles as well as the 7", so as to get different versions of the same song and the occasional extra track on the b-side which was not available anywhere else. for their side, the record labels clocked that 12" singles were lucrative, as they effectively (in a cost efficient way) meant that they could sell the same song to fans again and again. going further, early on multiple variations of 12" releases also counted towards the singles chart (which was once an important thing), and so staggered issues of new 12" singles could prolong the life of a song in the chart far further than the usual shelf life. 

easily one of the strongest, greatest and best examples of this was Two Tribes by Frankie Goes To Hollywood. as much as i love the band, and the song, the nine weeks it spent at number one was perhaps less the case of people discovering it over the course of two months, more so fans buying the new 12" of it record label ZTT (who infamously kept most of the income) issued every two weeks or so. not long after the chart rules were changed to prohibit exactly how many 12" singles counted towards sales for the chart. but don't hate the player, hate the game. except in the modern world, where it is that the blasphemous pornography of Ed Sheridan (or whatever) has desecrated the charts to the point that they are of no current value and all historical sentiment has been corrupted. 

happily, and but of course, one of the (many) 12" remixes of Two Tribes features here, in the form of a less re-issued one, the Carnage mix. usually it is the more famous (and certainly most bought) one that ends up on disc, the Annihilation remix. that is one i have on CD at least 15 times now, so it was a delight to get a mix that i only have half a dozen or so copies of already. 

a look, in the above image of the inner housing of the discs, presented of course in the greater good and glory of Commodore 64 mode. everything about this flimsy cardboard packaging says "cheap", under the presumed pretence of "more environmentally friendly than plastic". i confess, though, this makes it less bulky to handle, but i suspect (and fear) the packaging shall soon be damaged. well, it will if the discs get taken out and played frequently, which i am not so certain shall be. 

for further, or more, historical context or pop culture milestones, a 12" which could claim to be one of the most significant and important of the decade features here. whereas the chart success of Frankie Goes To Hollywood which was not controversy was 12" record sales, they cannot claim to have released the biggest seller of this format. so far as i am aware that honour remains with New Order and the original (1983, i think) 12" of Blue Monday. and that is here. an oddity is that i don't think too many bought any 7" variation of it, if even a 7" single of it existed. famously, of course, the record label for it actually managed to lose money with each sale of the record, due to the fancy packaging. 

mostly, or for the most part, my purchase was driven by the presence of a 12" that i always wanted but never owned as such. that would be I Beg Your Pardon off of Kon Kan, a song i loved generally but also specifically for the 70s disco dressed dude in the video. strangely my memory remains good for the large majority of vibes, and in this instance i know i still have the tape what i made where i taped this 12" off of Rohan. same tape features one lacking on this CD set, which is Love Missile F1-11 off of Sigue Sigue Sputnik. 

let me not dirty this post by complaining (too much) about inclusions i could have done with out. broadly, or specifically, though, well north of 50% of disc four (4) shall not be played. i am delighted with the Ray Parker Jnr and Tina Turner inclusions on it, also Kim Wilde's one is great, but for the rest, not too fussed. 

considerably more good than bad sits across all four discs, then. well, maybe just more, but still, i am not going to consider the investment a flawed or failed one. but yes, i am aware that all of this, and more (such as the Male Stripper 12 i would have loved to have seen included here) are undoubtedly available on some streaming service or another. consider me overweight and out of date by all means, but i just like the pleasure of putting on a disc rather than faffing to see what is where. even if it is like this, which seems to be less curated, more slammed together on the cheap. 

be excellent to each other!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!