Zoe Wees and Persia Holder The Jazz Café Camden April 4 2024
Well, last night was my first concert of the year and I thought it might be fun to start an occasional series of posts looking at my various live music experiences as I head towards the time when I might be too old to do this anymore!
I went to this concert with my youngest daughter, Hana, who I hadn’t been to a gig with for quite a while, so it was a real treat for me. I don’t get many opportunities to go out for an evening with her as she’s very much in demand and our days out have revolved around football in recent years. Anyway, we were both looking forward to seeing Zoe Wees so when the night arrived I was determined to enjoy it.
When we arrived at the venue, it was already quite busy with just half an hour until the support act. It was a standing only venue downstairs which can be a bit difficult at times for me. It’s not so much the physical element, as I am still quite fit for my age, it’s more the dynamic of the crowd and the feeling of being hemmed in. Luckily, in this case, there was enough room for me to have my own space and guard it as much as possible during both sets. When I was at the nearby Electric Ballroom, for the exclusive Pet Shop Boys concert that I won a pair of tickets to, the crowd started pressing in on me both front and back. Janet, who stood on the terraces as a teenager, was quite used to it but I got panicky and we moved to the side of the main standing room where we got a decent view without the fear. Knowing that we would be standing for over 2 hours I just made sure I was as relaxed as possible and awaited the support act, Persia Holder.
I always like to listen to the support act, and whenever I have written reviews, I have included a review of support sets which I feel are often not given their due. Anyone who arrived late missed an excellent set from Persia Holder who has built up a large following on Tik Tok (which I’m far too old for!) mainly singing covers, and whose set was around half an hour long. First things first, what a voice! Soulful, powerful and note perfect it just exploded into the venue helped by the excellent acoustics. She had a lot to pack in during such a short set, but she managed to fill every minute with real quality. Part of Persia’s appeal were the personal reflections and the stories she told between each song, especially the story as to how she got the support slot on the tour. Apparently she covered one of Zoe Wees’ songs and Wees herself started following and commented on the cover saying how much she enjoyed it. The rest, as they say, is history! For me, three songs stick out, the day after, two original songs and one cover. The two original songs were Passionate and What’s the Worst That Could Happen? which had excellent lyrics that trod an expert line between sadness and defiance in the first case and showed a knowing humour in the second. The tunes were excellent while the singing was passionate and effective at conveying a whole range of emotions. The cover of Becky Hill’s Remember had pretty much the whole audience singing along as Persia brought out a more emotional rendering of the song by slowing it down slightly and delivering it with real gusto. By the end of the set I was looking for Persia Holder on Spotify, Twitter and Instagram, finally finding her on the last of those. Wherever and whenever you find her, and she is on YouTube as well, you’ll be glad you did, because Persia Holder is absolutely terrific and I will definitely be following her career with interest from now on.
The arrival of Zoe Wees at 9pm really lifted the roof off. I had started listening to her in 2022 and was familiar with a number of tracks on her Therapy album, which I thoroughly recommend by the way, but judging by a number of the audience I was nowhere near as familiar with her songs as I thought. She started off with the fantastic Sorry for the Drama which is a song about her childhood. Zoe was brought up by a single mother after her father walked out and as a result the family struggled financially as you would expect. This song is Zoe’s apology to her mum for the way she acted out, as a result of the reactions of those around her. It is beautifully written and absolutely heart breaking. If you want to listen to it click on this link as it will confirm what an incredible talent she is. This song is part of a trilogy with 21 Candles and Daddy’s Eyes all of which deal with the effect of her father’s absence. 21 Candles reflects on her birthdays every year which saw her make a wish for her father to come back, a wish she eventually realised would never come true. Daddy’s Eyes, which is my favourite of all her songs, and the most devastating to listen to, tells the story of the one meeting she had with her father. She is deeply upset by the meeting and hates the fact that her eyes look exactly the same as his. This is the type of song writing power that far more famous artists could only dream of and is a reason why I think Zoe Wees is a generational talent. Throughout the set, Wees was chatty, personable, revealing and clearly overjoyed to be on stage in front of such an appreciative audience. Quite apart from her incredible writing talent, she has a voice that is incredibly expressive and powerful with a bluesy edge that really worked in the confines of the Camden Jazz Club. The quality never dropped at any point and it was a great first gig of the year.
Next week I am going to the Royal Albert Hall to see James Blunt, a present for my wife whose favourite venue this is. Variety is the spice of life and this counts as variety indeed! I will report back in further reflections of an ageing gig goer!
Bringing the cast together
This time, the film starts with the 14 children having been brought together as a whole group to watch the first two shows of the series in a small cinema. I can only imagine how mortifying it must have been for them to see their younger selves as (sometimes) precocious children and (mostly) moody mid teens! Don’t forget, documentaries seldom if ever got repeated so it would have been almost certainly the first time they had seen either documentary since its release. I would have hated it but like all the children, at this point, I would have felt something of a responsibility to keep going. After the showings they are shown having drinks and food together leading to a very interesting scene between would be East End wide boy, Tony, and the outwardly very privileged John. Tony, very perceptively muses on the ability of the documentary makers to choose the scenes they want to show in order to create characters for the participants. He talks about John being made to look like the good one and Tony made to look like the bad lad. John smiles and points out that he thinks it may well be the other way round to the audience! So, how were the 21 year olds portrayed and how did they react to the way their younger selves were shown?
21 Up
For me, the star of the show this time round was Tony. He has grown from a potential tearaway at 7 to a hard working 21 year old who has a fairly matter of fact attitude to the cards life deals him and invariably makes the most of his hand. An apprentice jockey at 14, he raced three times professionally for Tom Gosling’s stable. When asked by Michael Apted what happened he simply says that he obviously wasn’t good enough! At 14 he was asked what he would do if horse racing didn’t work out and he says he would become a taxi driver. At 21 he is on his moped getting the map of London fixed in his head for the famously tough test of black cab drivers, ‘The Knowledge’. He is a bookie’s runner at Walthamstow dog track and quite clearly fancies himself as a lady’s man. He talks about the three Fs which I will leave to your imagination and bemoans the fact that he couldn’t forget his current girlfriend! The overall impression you are left with is someone who is extremely adaptable and who will find a way to succeed whatever happens. He is certainly focused on whatever is next rather than what is past, a very useful skill to have.
John, who Tony was talking to in that opening scene is much more forthright about the way he and his class are viewed than either Andrew or Charles who perhaps feel the same way. He points out that just because they ended up going to the schools they predicted at 7 and, in two cases, the university courses they predicted, it wasn’t the fait accompli that it was perhaps portrayed as in the programme. The snapshots are simply that and don’t show the hours of study and exam preparation. While his point that they have to work hard is well made, he is still portrayed as very much a product of privilege, with a scene showing him as a ‘beater’ for hare coursing, which is now illegal, and a voiceover of him bemoaning the fact that opponents know nothing about it. He and Andrew are in their final years studying law at this point. Charles, meanwhile did not get into Oxbridge and was in his final year at Durham studying history. Although he still sounds very similar to John and Andrew, his long hair, casual clothing and casual demeanour indicate that he is now quite different from his two pre-prep school classmates.
The next trio are Jackie, Lynn and Sue, the three girls from the East End, two of whom went to comprehensive school and one who went to grammar. Lynn, the grammar school pupil, is married and working as a mobile school librarian by the time of 21 Up. She had thought of becoming a teacher but decided it was not for her, but she was clearly in her element as a librarian. Jackie also married at 19 and, amusingly, admits that there are times since the marriage when she has asked herself, ‘What have I done?’! Sue was not married at this point and worked in a bank, a job she was quite enjoying at the time. The three girls are apparently confident and still apparently a tight knit group despite the way that life has ushered them down different paths.
Nicholas, the boy who grew up on a Yorkshire Farm had lost his very strong regional accent, perhaps deliberately, and was at Oxford University studying physics. He seems to give a lie to the ‘show me the child at 7’ motto that set this documentary series on its path. He is no longer the shy, awkward child we saw at 7 or 14. Instead he is an outwardly, and seemingly inwardly, confident young man who knows where he wants to be and is enjoying Oxford enormously. When you saw him at 7, or actually 6 given that he was a year younger than the rest of the group, the young man in front of viewers now would be virtually impossible to picture.
Paul and Symon were two seven year olds we first met at a charity run boarding school. Symon stayed there until moving back in with his mother at 13 and Paul left at 8 when his family emigrated to Australia. Paul was flown back to the UK for the show and he and Paul are shown walking round their old school. Symon clearly sees it as a huge factor in his childhood but Paul remembers very little and is seemingly bored by the whole trip down memory lane. He has become a real Aussie in the intervening years with the accent and the lifestyle. He is a junior partner in a bricklaying firm and he has a settled relationship. Symon on the other hand is seemingly uncertain of where he wants to be in life and comes across as less confident and less focused. At that point, the era of £10 Poms, Australia truly was the land of opportunity and Paul has grabbed it with both hands. You wonder how different Symon’s life would have been if he had been given that opportunity.
Peter and Bruce are both at university at this point, the latter at Oxford studying Mathematics and taking his tutor through very complicated mathematical proofs that I couldn’t begin to follow! Bruce had been through a difficult time the previous year, when he signed up as secretary for four different societies and then had no time to do anything in any of his roles. Apparently he tried to avoid the rest of the students for 6 months as a result of the fallout! Peter doesn’t seem to want to be at university and has drifted through the course with little obvious enthusiasm. The two young men are still very much trying to find their way in the world.
Suzy, the star of Seven plus Seven saw her parents divorce at 14 and has since dropped out of university. Stress seems to have been an ever present theme of the intervening years and her brittleness is sad to see. She is travelling abroad on holidays seemingly to have something to do, but with the anchor of a strong family unit removed in many ways, she is drifting and cynical about the whole series and, indeed, pretty much anything else.
Finally, we have Neil, resentful of his own parents, another university drop out and squatting in a flat with a cat for company. He is quite matter of fact about squatting pointing out that otherwise this would be just one more empty flat with no purpose. It was quite interesting to see how squatting was so well organised and regulated at the time! Neil is clearly very unhappy and very directionless. Whether the documentary makers had an inkling that he would become such a central figure later on is open to conjecture, but you can’t help but see some foreshadowing here.
My reaction
This episode clearly shows that the adult versions of the children we already know are indeed shaped by their upbringing and experiences, but in ways that we can’t always predict. Seeing this series one instalment a week rather than one every seven years means you can make connections much more easily, but the danger is that you fall foul of the Latin phrase ‘Post Hoc Ergo Proctor Hoc’ which means ‘After it therefore because of it’. Are you looking for causal links that aren’t there? Perhaps. Did the viewers at the time do this? Almost certainly. It really gets into its stride here as a proper social and historical document and it is valuable far beyond that as an insight into lives you otherwise wouldn’t have any understanding of. 28 Up next and one of the most famous strands of the entire series. No spoilers though!
Catching up with the children
After a chance meeting in the Granada canteen, Michael Apted was commissioned to revisit the 14 children featured in the 7 Up documentary. The original was made in 1963 and broadcast in 1964, while this was made in 1970 and broadcast on December 15 of the same year. All 14 children took part, some more reluctantly than others, and clips of their seven year old selves answering questions help to frame the documentary. Given the age of the participants, and 14 is a very difficult age for all but the most fortunate, this was always likely to see them at their most guarded. However, I think it was absolutely vital for the future of the series. A 14 year gap would not have worked given the way that the children would bear little resemblance to their seven year old selves, but at 14 you have a fascinating glimpse of the child within and the adult to come. So what did I think watching this for the very first time?
7 plus Seven
The filming style is really interesting. We have gone from black and white to colour, but that colour is faded and gives the whole programme the air of a home movie. Gone are the scenes of school, play and family to be replaced by each of the 14 children on their own or in small groups, with an offscreen Michael Apted posing many of the same questions he did seven years earlier, and getting answers both similar and revealingly different.
For me, the star of this show was the most reluctant participant, Suzy. She makes it abundantly clear that she thinks the whole concept is a waste of time! Her eye rolls, impatient answers and undisguised frustration with Apted make her a real standard bearer of teenage irritation with the obtrusive older generation. For me, the best moment was when the family dog, playing in the garden of her father’s 4000 acre farm where she is being filmed, drags a dead rabbit out of the bushes. Suzy is almost completely unfazed, whereas Apted is clearly unsettled, and the reversal of roles is quite satisfying. You can tell that Suzy would rather be anywhere else and that she is doing this under sufferance, but that just makes her a counterpoint that the show needs.
Tony, who wanted to be a jockey at seven is on the way to achieving his ambition by being trained at a local professional stables and obviously eager to leave school behind. He is still confident, although the cheeky seven year old has faded to some extent, and he is fully focused on his chosen career. Interestingly, he is asked what he would do if he didn’t make it as a jockey and he already has a back up career of taxi driver in mind. He is asked the same questions as the other participants, and he answers them easily and confidently. I found myself urging him on as he clearly had ambition, determination and a real thirst for hard work.
Andrew, Charles and John are perhaps the most interesting to listen to five decades on. They are clearly set on the path to upper class success with two having gone to Charterhouse and one to Westminster. Somewhat dismissive of their younger selves, they have lost the more precocious edge they had at seven and developed what to modern eyes looks like a sense of entitlement within a world that perhaps exists as their stage. Their views on class, race and unions would definitely raise some eyebrows these days, but they were very much mainstream and reflective of their upbringing.
Jackie, Lynn and Sue, the three London girls seem to be just as tight knit as they were despite the fact that Lynn had made it to grammar school while the other two went to a comprehensive school. They are chatty, personable and, in their own way, as confident as the three upper class boys. However, and this is simply my own view, their confidence comes from supporting each other rather than competing with each other as Andrew, Charles and John seem to be. They often look to each other for agreement, but when they differ that seems to be just as supported by the other two. It’s a very nice example of that female friendship that seems to be a shield against the slings and arrows of life in general.
The other six boys are all interesting to listen to, but rarely rise above the expected in their answers. Perhaps Neil is the one whose responses were most revealing by the very fact of his nervous demeanour. I got the impression that it was deeper than appearing on camera, and more related to how he saw himself and his position in life. Paul and Symon who were at the same charity boarding school in 7 Up had moved to Australia and back home with his mother respectively. Nick, Peter and Bruce would have their times to shine in later episodes.
My Reaction
I have read a number of reviews from people who did not enjoy this instalment. In contrast, I found it fascinating and vital. Most of us, unless we have had particularly unpleasant teenage years, tend to look back at the age of 14 with rose coloured glasses. This programme lays bare the conflicts, difficulties and basic discomfort of a time when you are trying to find yourself as well as your place in society. Get past the faded colours and different viewpoints and you have a snapshot of what we all go through as teenagers.
What was 7 Up?
7 Up was a one off show produced by Granada Television as part of their World in Action documentary programme. In essence World in Action was the ITV equivalent of the BBC programme Panorama. However, it had a wider brief and frequently courted controversy in a way that it’s more staid counterpart would not. As well as this controversial edge, it was often much more innovative and took chances on new film makers and new ideas. One idea that made it to the screen was that of finding a group of seven year old children whose cohort would be likely to be running the country in the year 2000. Given that these children were seven in 1963, they would be 44 and at the peak of their careers by the end of that year. Well, that was one reason. The other was the often quoted, and variously attributed, adage ‘Give me a child until he is 7 and I will show you the man’. Although girls were included in the 20 chosen children, it was very likely that the boys were the main focus in the minds of the documentary makers when it came to their future impact on the UK. In the end, 14 of the 20 children were chosen to be interviewed in more depth, 10 boys and 4 girls. Those 14 children were Bruce Balden, Jackie Bassett, Symon Basterfield, Andrew Brackfield, John Brisby, Peter Davies, Susan Davis, Charles Furneaux, Nicholas Hitchon, Neil Hughes, Lynn Johnson, Paul Kligerman, Suzanne Lusk and Tony Walker. They came from a range of backgrounds as the underlying aim was to examine the impact of class on the lives of this new generation. Accordingly, they chose working class boys and girls alongside upper class boys, but only one upper class girl interestingly, to get a snapshot of their lives. By the way, it’s interesting to note that a snapshot is all it was supposed to be, since at the time it was only ever seen as a one off programme. Michael Apted, the film maker involved with the project throughout its run, has gone on record as saying that the lack of girls was a mistake brought about by a lack of foresight regarding the impact of feminism would have. You need to give the documentary makers some leeway of course, as hardly anyone foresaw those societal changes. The UK was a very much less diverse country in 1963, so it’s perhaps reasonable to argue that in including Symon, the only child from a mixed ethnic background, they were being quite forward thinking in their own way. So, how does this programme look six decades on?
7 Up World in Action
I suppose the first thing that strikes you is the way that in London Zoo, where all the participants were treated to a day out, the children are just that, children. By looking at them, you can’t really tell which social background they come from, even if you can make a few educated guesses. There is a brief scene where a boy who doesn’t appear in the rest of the programme is shown throwing stones at one of the animals, and is told off by one of the other children. The telling off is caused by the fact that the boy throwing stones has transgressed against the social norms that we are, or should be, bound by.
The first scene after the day out shots shows the child who had been doing the telling off in his school classroom singing a song whose tune is instantly familiar, but whose words aren’t. It turns out that this is a class in a Pre-preparatory school where the 7 year olds are singing Waltzing Matilda in Latin! These 7 year olds can already conjugate Latin verbs from memory and are clearly expected to do so with ease. The children, all boys, are almost unnaturally well behaved. All of them are paying attention and showing total engagement in a subject I found difficult to master in secondary school at the age of 12. When we see the three chosen boys being interviewed, John, Andrew and Charles, they answer questions with ease, assurance and, to modern ears perhaps, a touch of coaching. For example, when they are asked what newspapers they read, their answers range from The Telegraph to Andrew’s response of the Financial Times! They also have suspiciously adult views about The Beatles who apparently should cut their hair and play less raucous music! Another scene shows a boy acting as a parade ground NCO instilling discipline into his seven year old compatriots as they practice military drill. These boys are clearly very privileged and they have opportunities that the lower class children would never be able to access. The other upper class participant, Suzy, is shown doing ballet and interviewed in her headmistress’ study where she answers questions quietly but with a seeming air of confidence.
The classroom and playground scenes in an East End school which Tony attends show the class and behaviour divide extremely clearly. Even in those days, it’s clear that a lot of the teacher’s job is crowd control as a clearly inattentive Tony has to be told multiple times to turn around. In the playground, tarmac rather than the grass of the pre-prep school, the girls play skipping games while the boys fight with each other to burn off some of their excess energy. Tony is far more comfortable in this environment and when he is asked what he wants to do when he leaves school he answers that he wants to be a jockey. The questions for Tony, Symon and the rest of the working class participants seem far less aspirational than those for the upper class children. This is emphasised when the three East London girls, Jackie, Lynn and Sue are asked how many children they think they are going to have.
The other participant that really stands out at this point is Nick who lives in a remote part of the Yorkshire Dales and walks four miles a day to attend school. His remoteness together with his age, at 6 the youngest participant, seems to give him a different perspective from the others. He is clearly quite isolated from other children and therefore, perhaps, more affected by his family and his surroundings given the lack of socialising cues available to the others.
My reaction
As anyone who follows me will know, I am fascinated by social history and popular culture in all its forms. The number of questions raised by 7 Up in terms of our progress, or otherwise, as a society will no doubt be reflected upon at length as I re-watch the other episodes in the series. Two things occurred to me as I was watching it. Firstly, how children in essence don’t really change that much. Yes, they have technology all around them and access to ideas and materials that the 7 Up cohort could never have dreamed of, but at heart they are no different from seven year olds today. Put the classroom scenes into colour and it would be quite easy to believe that you are watching a modern day classroom. Secondly, I reflected on the small amount of progress we made towards a more equal society in the 1970s and 80s, where social climbing was possible, and how even that progress seems to have been lost as the class system has rediscovered its rigidity. It is no doubt something I will return to before this series of posts finish.
For me at the age of 12, as for so many others, children and adults alike, there was only one place to be on a Sunday evening, and that was watching The Muppet Show on ITV. Although the Muppets have been with us since the 1960s, and remain with us to this day as cultural touchstones, it is difficult to overstate the impact that the show had on audiences in 1977. For a start, the anarchic behaviour was unlike anything we’d ever seen before, and the readiness for sometimes very very famous guests to join in with this anarchy, send themselves up and play second fiddle to the Muppets was unheard of at the time. The other element that made it so original was the breadth of cultural and musical influences from classical to rock via country and jazz, and all points in between. I broadened my musical tastes because of The Muppet Show in much the same way as I had with Mike Batt’s Wombles a couple of years earlier. The Muppet Show album was a very well received Christmas present in 1977, and I played it until I was word perfect. It hasn’t been out of its sleeve for perhaps 45 years, so how will it stand the test of time? Only one way to find out!
Side One
We start off with The Muppet Show Theme as all the TV shows did and instantly I was reminded of teatime in the late 70s. It’s amazing how this simple tune took me straight back to my lounge in 1977. I could see the furniture, the fire, the rug and the TV in my mind’s eye. The sheer variety of the songs is astonishing, starting with Mississippi Mud, a song from 1927 that was originally recorded by Bing Crosby a year later, as part of Irene Taylor and The Rhythm Boys. It was a jazz influenced tune, but the Muppets turned it in a hoe down with stamping feet and a country and western feel. Next we have perhaps the most familiar song on the album, Mah Na Mah Na, a song that genuinely needs no introduction. The antics of the increasingly uncertain soloist are great on the album, and it loses very little from the lack of pictures. That, by the way, is a running joke throughout the album, perhaps best epitomised as we hear The Great Gonzo eating a rubber tyre to the music of Flight of the Bumble Bee! Mr Bassman by the ever cool Floyd, from Dr Teeth and the Electric Mayhem, the house band, accompanied by the less cool gopher, Scooter is an absolute delight. Originally a hit for Johnny Cymbal in 1963 it is given fresh life by the Muppet treatment. Musically, it is superb with tight instrumentation that never overshadows the interplay between the two singers. Also, having two singers gave it an edge over the original because Cymbal provided both voices himself, whereas here we already know both characters well which adds a backstory to the song that works perfectly. We move from that to the first of two A A Milne inspired songs, Cottleston Pie, originally a poem recited by Winnie The Pooh, then set to music. Rowlf, the piano player gives the backstory to the song and then intersperses the lyrics with various asides such as
This is where the song changes key. It’s what we call modulation. That’s G Sharp minor.
Cottleston Pie The Muppet Show Album 1977
It’s the kind of detail that is just delightful and set the Muppets apart. Who else would have thought of introducing music theory into a song for children? In a similar vein to the Rubber Tyre earlier, Marvin Suggs and his Muppaphone playing Lady of Spain, perhaps relies on having seen the original show, so for those of you who haven’t here it is.
The next two songs, Pachalafaka and Lydia the Tattooed Lady definitely appeal on different levels depending on the age of the listener. For a start, the ‘Turkish’ song Pachalafaka originally recorded by Earl Brown and Henry Mancini in 1958 has undertones of desire not immediately apparent to the average child, featuring as it does a veiled harem girl, who is enticing a tourist. The somewhat suggestive lyrics and the reveal at the end when the harem girl turns out to be a man with a moustache definitely puts a different spin on the tale! Lydia the Tattooed Lady comes from the film At the Circus and was sung by Groucho Marx. Once again, the potential double entendres which passed me by definitely don’t 45 years on. What is so clever, though, is that knowing the cheekier side of the song doesn’t make it feel any different, because the twelve year old inside of me still reacts in a relatively innocent way.
The final song on Side 1 was a very successful single in the UK, featuring Kermit’s nephew, Robin, with the absolutely lovely Halfway Down the Stairs. Sung with sensitivity and wistfulness it is two minutes of absolute magic that takes you back to your childhood in the purest and most marvellous way. It is the perfect end to a side that gives you a whistle stop tour of styles which epitomise the old style variety shows.
Side Two
This side starts off with Dr Teeth and the Electric Mayhem playing Tenderly. The playing is, of course, anything but tender especially with Animal on drums! It’s an excellent musical joke, but, until I heard the Rosemary Clooney version many years later, I thought it was meant to sound like that! Next, I’m in Love with a Big Blue Frog, is perhaps the oddest song on the entire album, in a very competitive field. I didn’t know before today that the original version was sung by Peter, Paul and Mary, more famous for Puff the Magic Dragon. It contains some marvellous lyrics and is simply very funny throughout. Tit Willow, sung by Sam the Eagle, accompanied by Rowlf on vocals and piano comes from Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Mikado, and is a forlorn attempt by the highbrow bird to introduce some culture into the proceedings. It is sung completely straight in a way that I am sure the original writers would have appreciated. Veterinarian Hospital, a soap opera parody, may be the template for my sense of humour with its corny jokes and love of word play, something that my family and friends may not thank The Muppets for! It was replaced by Pigs in Space in subsequent series, an equally funny take on science fiction shows.
There follow two absolutely superb performances that show The Muppets’ ability to add something to a song just through their choice of performers. Simon Smith and his Amazing Dancing Bear sees Scooter and Fozzie team up for a song written by Randy Newman and recorded by Alan Price, formerly of The Animals. It’s a song that tells the story of a poor performer who gains favour from the rich and famous because of his act, an interesting reflection on the difficult path to success for those of limited means. Straight afterwards, Miss Piggy gets her solo song with the Bolero influenced, ‘What Now My Love?’, a standard written by Gilbert Becaud with the original French title of ‘Et Maintenant’ and recorded by Shirley Bassey, Sonny and Cher and Elvis Presley amongst others. None of them were as threatening as the spurned Miss Piggy though! In her version, you are left in no doubt that the man who abandoned her faces retribution in no uncertain terms!
In keeping with the variety bills of the old music hall that so clearly influence the show, we have a trio of tracks starting with Fozzie Bear, the failed comedian. We then move on to a song called Hugga Wugga which is sung by an aggressive alien who is constantly interrupted by other aliens singing other songs. Every time this happens, the Hugga Wugga monster blasts the other singer, but whatever he does, he cannot stop a small yellow alien singing You Are My Sunshine. It is completely weird and something only the Muppets could get away with. The final oddity is Wayne and Wanda, a very serious pair of musical performers singing Trees. A famous version by Paul Robeson lasts for two and a half minutes, but Wayne and Wanda only manage the first two lines before the tree is cut down and falls on Wayne!
Sax and Violence is a jazzy number with Zoot the saxophonist forced into the demeaning role of playing one note at a time. At the start of the song he says ‘Forgive me Charlie Parker wherever you are!’ but the song itself simply bounces out of the speakers. It’s brilliant and, musically speaking, a real highlight on the album. Finally, Being Green is the song that, above all others, articulates the feeling of not fitting in due to a characteristic you can’t help, and then turns it around to become a song that celebrates the difference that many others will pick on. It is a plea for tolerance that rings down the ages, and it makes the perfect end to the record.
Final Thoughts
It has been just as thought and emotion provoking to return to The Muppets as it was returning to Disney and The Wombles There is something about the music of your childhood that was, in many ways, aimed at children that takes us back as if in a time machine. I was having an awful time at secondary school and The Muppet Show album was definitely a safe haven for me. Even now, it serves the purpose of making me feel less cynical about things, if only for 45 minutes or so.
David Pearce - Popular Culture and Personal Passions 