OBITER DICTUM
Celtic sounds have been far and few between in popular music. Some might think that the quite successful ditty by Cuntford and Cunts, “Little Lion Cunt”, incorporates a real sense of the Celtic tradition, but that is sort of like half-heartedly arguing Led Zeppelin weren’t raging plagiarists or something. While Timbaland and the like managed to work Bollywood and the Gamelan into the zeitgeist in sort-of recent years, the fiddle remains mainly on the outer, though recently Kings of Leon really outdid themselves at telling us all that they were from the South.
The Gaelic world is nowhere to be seen though, aside from the Pogues and um the Corrs. Then there’s “Come On Eileen”. Even in Kenwick, where the Nickelback CD to household ratio is higher than the national average (seasonally adjusted), I’ve heard this song blaring from car stereos more than once while checking the post. There’s something truly iconoclastic and charming about the song; it still sounds far fresher than whatever else was cutting edge back then. Of course, as is the case with several hit parade bargain supermarket compilation enshrined one-hit wonder groups, to see only this lovely tree is to completely miss the universe; but I haven’t made that clear yet. So, what makes Dexys Midnight Runners important outside of this song?
is something Kevin Rowland often dwelled upon. “It’s all a little matter of burning nature”, he casually remarks to Billy Adams as they chat amiably over “The Occasional Flicker” (that burning again). Kevin Rowland is the kind of human who has it all bursting within him constantly, like Neal Cassady or The Joker or Joan of Arc. He can’t hope to contain the profundity and adoration and supplication, the very existence of himself that is welling up and permanently churning in his gizzards. Filtering is not something he can do, like a girl who posts RU-486 receipts on her tumblr; we get pure, unconstrained, unconsidered Kevin all of the time, and this is rare as the proverbial chicken dentition when it comes to pop dudes. Dexys were his human honk, his vehicle for spilling forth and sharing what he couldn’t suppress or set aside. Without it, he might have shot himself or burned down houses or fell asleep with a needle in his arm. Sure, he often expressed himself with all of the subtlety of carving “I AM VERY EMOTIONAL AND PROFOUND” into his forehead with a penknife, but in fulfilling his irresistable urges he gave us a body of work that’s so giving and personal that it would be putrid and painful if it weren’t so damm full of relish and vim and vigour and queasy joy.
THE CELTIC SOUL BROTHERS
Though the early records would be accused of ‘emotional fascism’, of co-opting soul tropes for something more cynical (i.e. they seemed like punks), this was a response borne of an inability to comprehend how deeply felt all that wrong-note brassing and demented howling was. Dexys, after all, was a band who named their national tour ‘INTENSE EMOTIONS’. This is a group who, despite their flagrant costumery, unstable lineup and questionable business practices, always had the exchange of intense emotions as their selling point.
The singular thing about Dexys Midnight Runners which makes them a joy to listen to is that they managed to separate the sheer, delicate power of soul music from the bland universality and oversexed excess which had long divorced it from reality. By harnessing it to his own remarkably strange personality and journey, Kevin Rowland gave every iteration of the band a bewitching focus, transforming soul into an extremely fierce expressive tool. When the band changed gears to folkier, rootsy sounds, it still transcended facsimile. You can hear how hard they lean into those notes and strikes throughout those three albums; there’s nothing complacent or hollow, just, for want of a better word, soul.
BENEVOLENT DICTATORS BELIEVE IN THEIR SOULS
Yet it’s probably good to keep in mind this is the same guy who tells jokes during instrumental breaks to rapturous staged laughter amongst his ostensibly jolly bandfellows. I am chary of devoting a thousand words to Rowland alone. Like Mark E. Smith, he had a very definite knack for surrounding himself with talented people to inflict his megalomania/posturing/revisionism/warped genius etc. upon. Kevin “Al” Archer (“Al” because Rowland felt there wasn’t room for two Kevins in the group, sprach Wikipedia) was a bit of a handy assist on the first record, writing “Keep It” with Geoff on the saxophone and co-writing the two top 10 singles with Kevin. Despite this, Kevin ‘Slash-n-burn’ Rowland pushed him and more or less the rest of the whole lineup out of the picture well before they started recording the second LP; in part, ironically, due to Rowland insisting that “Keep It” become the third single. It tanked, and the band splintered. Rumor has it Rowland poached/pinched fiddler Helen O’Hara from Kevin’s new group The Blue Ox Babes, as well as much of the sound that would permeate Too-Rye-Aye. That fiddle on “Come On Eileen” is O’Hara’s. Kevin Archer you haven’t heard much of since, much less on 94.5 FM.
The only remaining member from the lineup that cut Searching for the Young Soul Rebels, Big Jim Paterson, became his right hand man for Too-Rye-Aye. There, he had a hand in writing each song, but by Don’t Stand Me Down he was more or less relegated to the orchestra pit, though he was pictured with the new ruling triumvirate of O’Hara, Adams and Rowland on the front. In 1992, Paterson was the only one who came back to help Kev revive the group/pay off his drug debts; but by the time Don’t Stand Me Down was reissued in 2002, Big Jim was almost completely excised, not appearing on the new cover or getting a mention in the liner notes. Divide et impera!
5. Keep It (no.9 from Searching for the New Soul Rebels, 1980)
This gets it just for the organ.
4. Plan B (no.6 from Too-Rye-Aye, 1982)
“Soon” was a lilting, disconsolate b-side to the “Show Me” single which came out in 1981. In that form, Kev’s intonations were massaged by sympathetic organs, but here, as the intro to “Plan B”, his nerves are rattled and his despair egged on by some clangorous Tin Pan Alley piano chords. Eventually that organ returns and crests until– “yoou’ve al-ways been SEARCHING FOR SOMETHING” and the whole thing gets delightful like banging two dustbin lids together in an elevator. Kev grabs the girl by the hand and promises her things will get better, IF THEY BELIEVE AND TRUST. The spoken word by the schoolgirl fails to throw it off, even; how many times will you hear that in your life?
3. There There, My Dear (no. 11 from Searching for the New Soul Rebels, 1980)
Kevin’s had a few songs which are more or less vehement screeds against dilettantes/liars/whoever set to a melody, but this one is irresistible. Chief amongst the reasons is the way Kev manages to a) completely skewer his target yet b) alienate nobody. Often, the kinds of songs that call bullshit on a specific kind of person fall completely flat simply because of how negative they are. Kevin avoid this trap, though: he stuffs his straw man to perfection (“If you’re so anti-fashion, why not wear flares!” “I don’t believe you like Frank Sinatra”), and he manages to keep just about everyone on side. His target is such an ultimate summation of the nebbish, moronic, non-committal, faddish, pretentious berk that lives inside all of us that no one could ever believe that this song is about them without simultaneously jumping off a pier and donating their unread Kerouac first editions to charity. Even the Robin addressed throughout would be incredulous.
“He must be talking about some other Robin. Man, I hate that Robin guy. Robin is such a dick.”
Besides, with a chorus that frenetic, one would be hard pressed to feel responsible for anything, lip trumpets and blaring trumpets. The only person who comes out looking like a dick is Rowland with his ‘new soul rebels’ nonsense and welcoming the new soul vision etc etc, but we know exactly what he means by it. That’s the problem with trying to express the inexpressible. Occasionally you look like a dick.
2. Let’s Make this Precious (no. 2 from Too-Rye-Aye, 1982)
do you mean it / well, yes I do!
then let’s sing it / well, certainly!
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. That live video doesn’t really do the job. This is a manifesto, a summation of philosophy and intent on the level of “I’m Stranded” or “The Wombling Song”, and in many ways it crowns everything they did well elsewhere. The organs shimmers opalescent, like in “Keep It”, the horns are magnificent and the match of No.3, the fiddles stretch it out like an infinite barn dance a la Eileen, and Kevin manages not to embarrass himself! Perfect! He’s the Hegel of pop music, possessed by his own divergent and elaborate systems that are too dense, fascinating and personal to be satisfyingly called bullshit. “Let’s Make This Precious” is a cannonball of momentum, a delirious dervish through the jubilation of being together and making a convivial and beautiful ruckus that’s pure. Purity isn’t an expression that can be thrown around with impunity, but Kevin shakes with the conviction that you can wash it anything away by combining horns, organ and fiddle and stirring lightly, and he’s right.
1. This Is What She’s Like (no. 3 from Don’t Stand Me Down, 1985)
Like the smell of urine in a cupboard, how it arrives is an utter mystery, and once it gets a foothold it won’t ever leave. Avoid the single edit and listen to the full length 12:24 version, which more or less blows apart completely the Myth o’ Eileen and the idea of the pop song. There’s
–two or three minutes of howling
–bad jokes involving the Italian language (not poor taste)
–class hatred over linguistics
–group harmonies reminiscent of Pet Sounds (taken directly from the Rolling Stone Guide to Facile Similes)
–intense loathing of the members of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament
–a belligerent maverick genius which inhabits every one of the seven hundred and forty four seconds this will take of your time to fully consume which makes this the best Dexys Midnight Runners song.
