— Dave Rimmer
In an episode of the hilarious but kind of maligned American sitcom How I Met Your Mother, the characters Ted (Josh Radnor) and Barney (Neil Patrick Harris) have made a bet to see who can land the same girl first. Ted initially gets the upper hand and tells his friend all about her. "She plays bass in a reggae band," he enthuses. "Oh, does she know that one song 'mm-mm chaka, mm-mm chaka'?" Barney asks, "what's that song called? Oh right, it's called every reggae song". Though no genre is more identified with a particular sound, I think the idea that all reggae songs sound the same is a recent one — and much of it stems from an octet from Birmingham named after an unemployment benefit form.
There's this idea that UB40 started off well enough with a brilliant debut album and a respectable run of singles before lapsing into cover version hell. There's more than a little truth to this (all three of their UK number ones are covers and they never had a big hit in the US with an original) but it's not quite as simple as its portrayed. They spend much of the eighties relying on their own material and their first album of covers (1984's Labour of Love) is actually quite good. In truth, their only real howler at the time was their weedy version of "I Got You Babe" with Chrissie Hynde. Yes, "Red, Red Wine" set a bad precedent but we'd see scant evidence of it until the nineties rolled around when they began butchering Motown and soul classics. I think it's even possible that they were self-aware enough to know that their spike in sales came with a backlash. Previous album Baggariddim made a case for legitimacy by reworking older tracks with guest singers and toasters. Results were mixed but the successful yet terrible "I Got You Babe" overshadowed the rest of the set and did little to re-establish their reggae cred. UB40 returned in '86 with Rat in the Kitchen. Album's cover and title imply a return to their working class roots but the results fail to match the magnificent Signing Off from six years earlier. But it's fine and Colette Campbell's brief review in Smash Hits pretty well nails it.
Dave Rimmer isn't especially taken with the near-title track "Rat in Mi Kitchen" (he reckons it's "not bad" and considers it a "jaunty reggae number" and that amounts to the musical "analysis") and chooses to focus on its title. Indeed, Rims spends much of the singles page looking at song titles at the expense of content. Fair enough, I would imagine that he was getting bored with doing standard evals for the nineteenth time and decided to take a different tack this time round. (Also, he doesn't exactly have a loaded lineup of records in front of him, what with the post-Christmas lull and all, which also explains his desire to jazz up a poor selection by examining something other than the tunes themselves). And, yes, this is the Title of the Fortnight, albeit mainly due to there not being much else of note.
The song itself is lively enough and it's easy to imagine it being a firm favourite on the touring circuit. There's not much to say about it musically that Barney Stinson hasn't already said and they weren't in any hurry to push away from their established pop-reggae sound. (Significantly, two of their better later numbers, "Reckless" and a remix of the brilliant "One in Ten", were done in cahoots with Afrika Bambaataa and 808 State respectively and are also two of their least formulaic efforts; the two records also both reached number seventeen, fact fiends) Lyrically, it's dominated by sloganeering with hypotheticals ("when I catch you up, I'm gonna pull you up, I'm gonna check out inside your brain") that don't seem to be as menacing as they think. The group had been out of the political game for a while and it shows. It doesn't really work as a dig at Mrs Thatcher (assuming that's who this nutria is meant to be) but as generic advice for the listener it also seems confused. Of course, I initially thought it was all about poverty, having assumed that they were singing about how they were intending to "feast on it": so there's yet another misheard lyric on my part (just once could the correct line be superior to the one I thought up?).
Nevertheless, "Rat in Mi Kitchen" charmed enough of ver kids who were no doubt prompted into using up Christmas record tokens on it that it got into the Top 20 in the early part of 1987. Having just missed the charts with its pretty good predecessor "All I Want to Do", this was a bit of a coup for the band, who typically only enjoyed considerable hit parade success with each album's maiden single. It also ushers in a run of SOTF from '87 by prominent acts. We'll see an abundance of Rock & Roll Hall of Famers, major chart fixtures and critical darlings as the also rans begin to fade away. Though if you're a fan of That Petrol Emotion then prepare to be dead chuffed.
~~~~~
Also Reviewed This Fortnight
XTC: "The Meeting Place"
"An original title but a fairly yawnworthy one", Rimmer sniffs. I cover XTC a lot in this space because I am a fan. Not a rabid obsessive (having each album in one format apiece is plenty for me) but they are one of my favourite groups — and "The Meeting Place" is one of my favourite songs. One of five Colin Moulding contributions to their masterpiece Skylarking (Andy Partridge "only" got nine tracks on the album which prompted a great deal of sulking), it is a beautiful piece and a perfect example of its composer's ability to base a pop song around his innate modesty. For when you're both excited and a little apprehensive about meeting that special someone.
No comments:
Post a Comment