it's still kind of night time, well, early morning really

Went to sleep so early last night it an early wake up was almost inevitable. It's just me and Nancy in the sitting room waiting for the day to begin. 

I actually like the night time, so I don't know why this stupid song by Russell Morris got in my head, called 'I Don't Like the Night'. When I was 15 I did my work experience at Richmond Recorders, which you'd think would somehow be formative but it didn't feel formative at all. It felt dull and annoying. There was nothing to do and Russell Morris and the Rubes were recording 'demos for Japan', like, really. One of the songs they were doing was called 'I Don't Like the Night'. This was ultimately released on an album they put out that year, but it wasn't the Richmond Recorders version. Intriguing. Anyway I don't even know why I'm telling you this.

Russell Morris and the Rubes only existed in I guess 1980-81 and I suppose they were an attempt to update Russell Morris from late 60s-early 70s balladeer (which as far as I'm concerned is what he was best at) to a hot act for the 80s. Morris was 32 and, so, not in the least bit old. It still seemed like a bit of a stretch. I recall the guys in the control room saying of Russell while he was laying down his vocal things like, 'geez mate fuckin' give up you has been'. About ten years later I saw him in the cast of Jesus Christ Superstar taking much less of a role than Farnesy, but you know, still battling away and then he went on to have some actual hit albums of new material in the last ten or so years. 

These are my early morning thoughts, I bet yours are more interesting. 

completely apropos of nothing - he's not dead as far as I know though glenn wheatley is, as of yesterday

I don't know why but I was just moved to play Alice Cooper's 'I Never Cry', the last song on the first side of ...Goes to Hell. I was mainly thinking of how it is a massively superior song to its closest relation in the Cooper canon, 'Only Women Bleed', which to my mind sucks a big turd. 'Only Women Bleed' is Meatloaf-y; 'I Never Cry' is like 'Without You' or, lyrically of course, it's a little bit of a ref to 'I'm not in Love'. Bizarre to think that a mere four years later he was doing Flush the Fashion. I assume that 'I Never Cry' isn't a record he thinks about much, and that Flush the Fashion is a record he would like to have erased from everyone else's memory but not his own just in case he decided, having forgotten it, that it would be a good idea. 

I give kudos, I suppose, to 'Only Women Bleed' re: all the people who thought it was about menstruation which I think it pretty categorically isn't though of course Cooper and whoever his minions/masters were all knew that it would be considered to be referencing that. Is that worth kudos? I don't know. It is apparently about domestic violence. It seems to me to be so soap-operatic. I think it is a shitty song musically. 

I could be wrong but I'm pretty sure John Farnham used to do 'Only Women Bleed' live. I have to say I pretty much disagree with every song choice he made, since 'Things to Do', anyway.