Recently I’ve become fond of songs with real stuff in them – clips of speeches, film etc. Spirit’s fantastic “Future Games” is the first time I heard this – a whole album interspersed with bit of Star Trek, The Muppets, US radio…and more recently we have Public Service Broadcasting who do it really well too. In fact I did a recording project with a load of clips in too (though modesty prohibits posting one of my own – copies available on request…). This clip is a favourite of Twang Jr who learned the sax part, but what got me is the sensational clip of JFK. Post other examples here…
https://youtu.be/kV8yjMeU2X0
Vulpes Vulpes says
Oooh yes, here we go:
Twang says
Reminded me of this one….
Timbar says
Great choice with Future Games. It’s a wonderful album.
This song used to turn up on Capital Radio in the 70s & I’m never sure if it’s really good, or really cheesy.
Rigid Digit says
Carter USMs 30 Something opens with dialogue from Red Dwarf:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8l6vTw97QWs
and closes with the Michael Caine’s closing dialogue from Alfie:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y3uuwn4oIls
fentonsteve says
Similarly, almost anything by Pop Will Eat Itself. ‘Def Con One’ for starters.
“Even a stopped clock gives the right time twice a day” from Withnail & I. Ride – Cool Your Boots:
anton says
when did Star Trek become “real stuff”? (asking for a friend….)
Twang says
Tell your friend just listening to Future Games makes you question what’s real. Brilliant album.
anton says
meanwhile…………………
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgskINKZWjY
garyt says
From the terrific (and sadly only) 1985 Colourbox album. Lots of samples from movies, TV shows etc.
Moose the Mooche says
This has a shitload of film stuff in it, like the album it comes from, mostly from classic British films. Including, from Britannia Hospital, the deathless line “You wouldn’t know Karl Marx from a toffee apple!”
Harold Holt says
Chris Whitley Dust Radio, about 4 minutes in when it goes onto the car radio, turning the dial through stations. Unfortunately I think this Youtube vid cuts it short, since on the album it wanders onto a gospel station, a few other places, then back to the track.
retropath2 says
This song has the best use of radio and dialling thru’ the stations, with a burst of Purple, a snatch of the Pistols and a taste of 2-tone, before Kev shouts through it all, For Gods sake, Burn it Down…..
The single version of Dance Stance aka Burn it Down
Mike_H says
Bonzo Goes To Washington “5 Minutes”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Minutes_(Bonzo_Goes_to_Washington_song)
3 different mixes were released on an E.P. on Sleeping Bag records.
The C-C-C Club Mix, the R-R-R Radio Mix and the B-B-B Bombing Mix
jazzjet says
A bit tangential but the German radio bit at the start just makes this track:
Mike_H says
Talking of German Radio bits at beginnings…
(Brian Eno & Snatch “R.A.F.”
Rigid Digit says
Jon Snow’s News report of the kidnapping of John McCarthty on:
Stiff Little Fingers – Beirut Moon
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YsTfXKLw_5k
attackdog says
I was just thinking about this earlier in connection with the song ‘Qu’ran’ from the wonderful My Life in The Bush of Ghosts.
I had the original LP followed by the CD which omits the track.
I’ve never understood why? I know Byrne/Roxy bloke made the decision to drop the track in deference to, I think, The Islamic Council GB, but what specifically was it that caused so much offence?
Tiggerlion says
This is Davd Byrne’s explanation:
“Way back when the record first came out, in 1981, it might have been ’82, we got a request from an Islamic organization in London, and they said, ‘We consider this blasphemy that you put grooves to the chanting of the Holy Book.’ And we thought, ‘Okay, in deference to somebody’s religion, we’ll take it off.’ You could probably argue for and against monkeying with something like that. But I think we were certainly feeling very cautious about this whole thing. We made a big effort to try and clear all the voices, and make sure everybody was okay with everything. Because we thought, ‘We’re going to get accused of all kinds of things, and so we want to cover our asses as best we can.’ So I think in that sense we reacted maybe with more caution than we had to. But that’s the way it was.”
attackdog says
Thanks Tigger. Still seems a little vague.
I suppose I was thinking there must have been some very specific reasoning.
After all, other art forms make their own interpretations of Islam without ……
Oh.
Tiggerlion says
They dropped it before their second edition in 1982. The fatwa against Salman Rushdie was 1989. I’m not sure artists were too worried about upsetting Islam before that. I may be wrong.
Twang says
I think for many people that was the first time they became aware of such, ahem, sensibilities.
Vulpes Vulpes says
…and it was the first time I made the effort to bloody well ensure that I have both vinyl and CD* copies of both the with and without versions of the album. When it comes to religious fuckery of this order, I’m French.
* yes, there are CD versions out there which include the track.
Mike_H says
They most likely objected to actual verses of the Koran being set to music (and being jumbled up a bit too, I think).
There is a tradition of Islamic praise songs, which most Muslims are appreciative of, but the verses of the actual book, as I understand it, are only supposed to be chanted without musical accompaniment.
I have both the original vinyl* and the extended “Enhanced” CD versions.
Only early vinyl pressings and cassettes had the track “Qu’ran” at the start of side 2. On later pressings and cassettes it was removed and replaced with the alternative track “Very, Very Hungry”.
According to Discogs.com it was changed later in the same year that the album was issued, 1981. I don’t know how reliable they are on such specifics, mind you.
attackdog says
Thanks Mike. That sounds a very likely explanation.
When I spent time in Morocco years ago – around the time the album was released – it was hard to avoid hearing traditional music and I do now remember being told the stories and chants did not have a religious bias.
fentonsteve says
“When you hear the air attack warning, you and your family must take cover immediately”.
anton says
shit jest got real…at last I get to use that line
Moose the Mooche says
This should be on my thread ——>
anton says
take that thing out my ear
anton says
Sniffity says
From New Zealand, 1987, comes Shona Laing…
Milkybarnick says
Avalanches? Sounds like complete nonsense, but works so well.
Gary says
Take it away, Woody Guthrie:
“I hate a song that makes you think that you’re not any good. I hate a song that makes you think that you’re just born to lose. Bound to lose. No good to nobody. No good for nothing. Because you’re either too old or too young or too fat or too slim or too ugly or too this or too that. Songs that run you down. Songs that poke fun at you on account of your bad luck or your hard traveling. I am out to fight those kinds of songs to my very last breath of air and my last drop of blood. I am out to sing songs that will prove to you that this is your world and that if it has hit you pretty hard and knocked you for a dozen loops, no matter how hard it’s run you down or rolled over you, no matter what color, what size you are, how you are built, I am out to sing the songs that make you take pride in yourself and in your work. And the songs that I sing are made up for the most part by all sorts of folks just about like you.”
Dreadzone ‘American Dread’:
The Actual North says
Son of Nur Nur Nur Nineteen..
Black Celebration says
Look no further than OMD’s Dazzle Ships. Take it away, Wikipedia:
The “Radio Prague” track is the actual interval signal of the Czechoslovak Radio foreign service, including the time signal and station ID spoken in Czech. “Time Zones” is a montage of various speaking clocks from around the world. Neither “Radio Prague” nor “Time Zones” carry any writing credit at all, with OMD being credited only for arranging the tracks. The “This Is Helena”, “ABC Auto-Industry” and “International” tracks also include parts of some broadcasts recorded off-air (a presenter introducing herself, economic bulletin and news, respectively).
Chrisf says
More OMD – from the “Pacific Age” album, the track “Southern” featuring snippets of MLK….
Not listened to Pacific Age in a long time, have to dig it out this weekend. Great album
Black Celebration says
I’d forgotten that one. Not a lot of love generally for the Pacific Age. I think in those days bands were so terrified of the dumper that they released one album a year.
Sniffity says
Here’s a worldwide hit that was virtually nothing but “real stuff”
Any suggestions as to what would be the earliest example?
Rec Room says
My (ahem) 2nd posting of this same Tull song in a single week is… Radio Free Moscow! from Jethro Tull’s 80’s zenith (career nadir?) Underwraps. The broadcast in the intro is of course from Radio Moscow. This being one of the sexier fronts of the Cold War, where rival sides (here the USSR) would broadcast radio programs to the West whereon they bragged about how rosey things were in the East and how conversely dodgy they were in the West.
Have I mentioned I love this song?
https://youtu.be/r9sYI8gnzbE
Rec Room says
A more well worn example of Twang’s OP would be,
Twang says
Of course on the “Bookends” album there was a track which was just old people talking with no music at all! Possibly too much real!
Moose the Mooche says
Hence one of my family’s catchphrases, “Can’t get up the mucus!”
Rigid Digit says
Can’t Stop The Mucus (Village People, 1980)
Moose the Mooche says
Snot funny.
Freddy Steady says
Was. And you can boogie to it.
Sniffity says
So it’s your Pick Of The Week?
It got right up my nose.
Moose the Mooche says
Golly!
Carl says
S&G again – Baby Driver
… and it’s the world champion etc…
mrxsg says
How about a bit of Living Colour
Moose the Mooche says
I have this as a 12″ 45RPM vinly.
The most magnificently fuckoffly loud thing in my collection. And with a live Should I Stay Or Should I Go on the other side, the NUMBER ONE HIT by The Clash.
Sorry, my neighbours….
Alias says
This one samples Martin Luther King and a news reporter saying “Kennedy’s been shot” at least that is what I always thought he said but on listening again today I’m not 100% sure. An absolute classic none the less.
Maceo and the Macks – Soul Power ’74.
Moose the Mooche says
Nothing realerer than this. Yer actual audio verite… and what a great song it turns into.
https://youtu.be/mR6BeerSSWw
dai says
The Manics do it a lot, especially on The Holy Bible. Chilling …
John Walters says
Another Simon and Garfunkel song.