Saturday Random Five won’t pay my bills; I want money.

Surrender into the Roses (demo) by Kate Bush Album: Cathy Demos
Kate Bush is a legend. It’s been 20 years since I first heard ‘Hounds of Love’, the second side of which is like going to another world, or seeing someone’s whole life from space. Such a creative voice and songwriter.

Kate started her music career early, recording about 200 demos (!) by age 19. Some of these have escaped the drawer and appear on various albums under the title ‘The Cathy Demos’. The quality of the recordings sounds like a very young Kate set a boombox to REC and started playing the songs, but that’s part of the appeal. You get a very early glimpse of this raw talent. Worth tracking down if you like Kate. I’m sure there must be a torrent somewhere.

Money (Parts 1 & 2) by Flying Lizards Album: Flying Lizards
Euroclash is dead, but here’s where it started. The bored female vocals, the DIY instrumentation, the strange electronica touches — it’s all here. Not to mention a found recording of how to set up speakers in a room. A lot of that experimental stuff from the early 80s hasn’t aged well, but this has a timeless appeal.

I used to walk around Spokane with this girl named Liz who wore really red lipstick and who could do a perfect impersonation of this song. Liz, if you’re out there, big smooches.

Stay Loose by Belle & Sebastian Album: Dear Catastrophe Waitress
Are B&S channeling the Police or something? Or perhaps they’ve pulled that organ from an OMD album. Whatever it is, I want more. The songwriting came up a long way on this album — they sound like they really know what they’re doing. Having Mr Art of Noise Trevor Horn as producer must have helped. Early Belle & Sebastian had a naïve charm, but here they’ve really dug into the back catalogue and come up with great tunes. This song’s a long one, but I don’t want it to end.

Exile by Enya Album: Watermark
Listening to Enya was all I did in 1991. People asked me, “Which Enya album is the best one?” and I’d say “Whichever one’s longest.” But fifteen years later, is that a good thing? Especially when the new Enya album doesn’t depart measurably from the very first Enya album. Enya’s Enya, I get it. But these days I don’t really feel the need to go to Enyaland very often. It’s still a beautiful place even though I’ve already been.

My copy of this album was mistracked, and this track doesn’t cut off until eight seconds into the next song, probably because the sound technician was getting all floaty. I had to join the two tracks and cut it into separate mp3s myself. Is anyone else’s copy like this? Is it a rarity? Can I sell it on eBay? Here’s the description: “ENYA Watermark CD with wonky song boundaries RARE new age meditation sleep catatonia”

‘Cello Song by Nick Drake Album: Five Leaves Left
I got into Nick Drake via Stephen Duffy — he took the name “The Lilac Time” from Drake’s song ‘River Man’. Now, of course, everyone likes to say they listen to Nick Drake, just like they’re really reading that copy of Dostoyevsky on the coffee table. I see this album as somewhere between Neil Young and Cat Stevens, but that’s not a very satisfying description. Robin Frederick describes the Drakean mood well: a “dark, introspective romanticism”. And that description could equally fit the cello as an instrument; no wonder it appears here. There’s something happening between the brisk pace of the bongos and the long melodic line of the cello — a mood that’s melancholy and uplifting at the same time.

Bleah. Just go listen.