Perry's Pen

Has the state of the world and cost of living got you strung out? Are you sick of the pressure and feel like screaming? Well this ain’t nothing new kid, it’s only the latest.

There’s an old adage that says, “If you aren’t depressed, you’re not paying attention”. It’s a phrase I find comforting for a few reasons. The first is that it rings true and makes me feel more normal. Hearing it makes me feel less alone in my thoughts. The second is that one of the few people who I have heard say it aloud is my dad’s second wife, a woman who I respect immensely.

In this post I will explore old songs that spoke to the problems of the 80s, problems that feel eerily similar to what is going on with the world now. The point of this post is to make you feel less alone, less freaked out, less closed in. And maybe shake yer booty.

Spandau Ballet felt our pain

There’s a band from England called Spandau Ballet. They took their name from seeing graffiti about Rudolf Hess being the only occupant Spandau Prison. Their big hit single is probably True, which Toronto band Blue Rodeo completely copied with their song Try. Shame on you, Jim Cuddy! It is often disheartening to be Canadian.

However, if you are feeling lost and have had enough, Spandau Ballet’s song Chant no 1 might speak to you. One of the reasons why I like the song so much is that it is an English band trying to incorporate American style funk into their sound.

Chant No 1 (I Don’t Need This Pressure On) was a BIG song to me in my youth. I don’t think it appeared on any charts or got airplay, but even without the internet it was a song that got across the ocean and spoke to us poor white kids in Canada. Wow, I thought: there are other people feeling just as depressed and hopeless, and they live on the other side of the ocean!

The song stands the test of time and is more appropriate than ever. Check it out:

World War 3 you say?

Yeah, it certainly feels that way, doesn’t it? You know the facts as well as I do: WW III breaking out on at least 3 continents, the cost of living is making us all sick, competent politicians being more rare than baseball players who hit .400, AI panic… the list is endless.

There’s a punk rock band from British Columbia, Canada called DOA that has been doing their thing for about 40 years. I loved them when I was a kid, but now I am kinda meh. DOA is more about emotion than intellect, and I like to think that I have outgrown them. I DO thank them for being around when I was young though. Bloodied but Unbowed indeed.

While I may have outgrown DOA’s kneejerk, simple politics, one of their songs that stand the test of time is World War 3. And as much as I belittle their frontman, Joe Keithley, he HAS put his elbow grease where his mouth is. He’s been an elected member of Burnaby BC city council since 2018, so hats off to an old punk trying to fuck things up in a good way. Keithly definitely subscribes to SHOUT philosophy, which we will discuss later.

Here’s dancing to Armageddon, and punk rock, at its primordial best:

PART 2: Shout, Shout, let it all out!

A lot of crazy things came out of the 6-6-60s. One of them was something called Primal therapy. Invented by Arthur Janov and initially quite popular with people like John Lennon, primal therapy is now largely regarded as quackery. Primal therapy centered around shouting to discover repressed childhood traumas. It was alleged that by doing so, the shouter/patient could heal those traumas and live a healthier life.

British pop ban Tears for Fears found a lot of success in the 80s. They found Janov’s writings crucial as well, with one of their biggest hits being Shout. In other words, Tears for Fears were big proponents of Primal therapy, and some of their biggest songs were more or less primal scream sessions.

Similarly, The Style Council, Paul Weller’s post-Jam band had a song called Shout to the Top. For the purpose of this post, the song Walls Come Tumbling Down! is more appropriate. Mr. Weller implored us to take action and live life with these lyrics:

“You don’t have to take this crap
You don’t have to sit back and relax
You can actually try changing it
I know we’ve always been taught to rely

Upon those in authority
But you never know until you try
How things just might be
If we came together so strongly

Are you gonna try to make this work
Or spend your days down in the dirt
You see things can change
Yes and walls can come tumbling down”

Paul Weller

Part 3: DIY Depression Busters

While certain eggheads and pretentious Canadians get to decide what is right, what is wrong, and what is quackery, I decide to choose for myself. There is a lot to be said about the benefits of shouting, exercise, and yes, even being able to speak freely.

A lot of the best artists in the 80s felt the same way. They shouted at an American president and administration that seemed hell-bent on encouraging nuclear war and bringing on the apocalypse. For me, the angriest, best, and most important was Dead Kennedys. Frontman Jello Biafra shouted at everything that need to be shouted at, and even shouted at Diane Feinstein after she died!

But speaking of Canadians, there was an outfit out of Ottawa called Singing Fools that had a minor hit with a song called The Apocalypso. The song included a lengthy sample of a Ronald Reagan speech and fun lyrics such as:

They’re all getting down from Grenada to Soweto
To the hottest little number since the The Mashed Potato
Dance, dance, dance, until they drop

Part 4: Everything old is new again

Furthermore,Bryan Ferry of Roxy Music encouraged us to “Dance away the heartache, dance away the tears”. Ferry’s colleague, fellow classic rock music dinosaur Pete Townshend has said a lot of provocative things over the years, and this rings true:

“Music, even today, has a function, which is to help us understand what is going on in the world and to help us understand what is going on inside us.”

Pete Townshend

And all that (finally) brings me to the point of this blog post: my version of a playlist for dancing and shouting away our depressions about the strife in the world.

A large portion of that playlist has been exhausted with the nonsense I shared above, but let me proceed with what is left.

1) Ultravox – Dancing with Tears in My Eyes

I’m not a huge fan of this song, but I remember it being huge. It is based a book On the Beach. Written by Nevil Shute, which centers around Australians waiting for the end of the world after nuclear war breaks out in the Northern Hemisphere.

Dancing with Tears in My Eyes was co-written by Midge Ure. Midge shouted at the famine in Ethiopia by putting together the song “Do They Know It’s Christmas?” with Bob Geldof. He was also one of the prime movers behind Live Aid.

Say what you want about Midge Ure’s efforts and copycats like “Sending Our Love Down the Well”. The fact of the matter is that he danced away his depression and helped 2 continents do the same.

2) Sun Ra -Nuclear War (it’s a MoFo!)

I didn’t learn about Sun Ra until 1988. I was working and hanging out at CJAM, a college radio station in Windsor, Ontario. There was a show called Johnny on the JAM, and I eventually befriended the host. Johnny was a Detroit guy who crossed an international boundary to do a radio show. Even though he was a volunteer, he needed a work permit.

If you are not familiar with Sun Ra and the Arkestra, you need to take a peek down that rabbit hole. Sun Ra claimed to be “about 800 years old” and from Saturn.

Johnny was big into all sorts of cool things like and did theme shows. One Friday he played Sun Ra’s Nuclear War and a cover of the same by Brian Ritchie of Violent Femmes fame. 

DIG!

I can still hear Johnny saying, “If they push that button, your ass has gotta go.”

3) Reagan: We begin bombing in 5 minutes

Ronald Reagan infamously said “My fellow Americans, I’m pleased to tell you today that I’ve signed legislation that will outlaw Russia forever. We begin bombing in five minutes” as a warmup, a soundcheck for a national radio address in 1984.

While not intended for the public, this “joke” certainly offered an insight into Dutch’s mindset. I suspect that the state of Israel has a similar mindset in terms of Palestinians. Reagan’s comment didn’t sit well with anyone, but again, some of us just had to laugh and dance.

Two such examples are Time Zone, a collaboration between a white punk pioneer and a Black hip-hop pioneer. The other is also a collaboration between a white man and a Black man, this time between Jerry Harrison of Talking Heads/Modern Lovers fame, and Bootsy Collins of Parliament Funkadelic fame.

• Afrika Bambaataa & John Lydon – World Destruction
• Bonzo Goes To Washington – 5 Minutes (Jerry Harrison Bootsy Collins)

Bootsy, baby!

The one time I saw Bootsy live was when he was playing bass for Deee-Lite. It was one of the best concerts I have seen. Most people consider Deee-Lite to be one-hit wonders, but their first album is sensational, start to finish. Furthermore, it brings in all kinds of cultures and musical genres and broke new ground.

The air attack warning sounds like? Dancing!

Relax is probably the one and only song that people know or remember when they think of Frankie Goes to Hollywood. Two Tribes is equally as good though, and the video is timeless.

Witness this, brothers and sisters. Two old men in a barbaric fight, a cock fight. The video came along before mixed martial arts. People pay money to see the fight, they are transfixed. In the end though, the spectators resort to fighting amongst themselves.

This just in!

The NY Times included a review of Laurie Anderson’s one-off show with the jazz combo Sexmob in Brooklyn in their Oct 21, 2023 edition. This song was embedded in the article and is is along the same lines of this post.