Well, here's a song I had no idea there had ever been an official video for. From 1992, it's XTC and their simultaneously quite profound and fiendishly catchy "Ballad of Peter Pumpkinhead."
Now that I've seen it, of course, I'm torn over which is cooler -- the song itself or those vintage Gretch and Vox guitars the band is using.
Two things need to be added here. First, there is a special circle in hell reserved for the members of Crash Test Dummies, who covered the song -- execrably -- on the 1995 sountrack to Dumb and Dumber (the ironies, as they say, abound). Second, though it pains me to say it, the song is -- well, "cribbed" may be the wrong word, so let's just say "strongly inspired" -- by "King Strut," a 1990 should-be-classic from criminally undervalued singer/songwriter/guitarist Peter Blegvad, and if you doubt it, get thee to iTunes and download it now.
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8 comments:
or that car! love that car too -- cant tell what make/model it is
As soon as I saw the headline and XTC in the next line, I was hoping it would be "Dear God." Nice tune, though!
Andy Partridge and band were interviewed by the local radio station when this came out. "Here, we like The Ballad of Peter Pumpkinhead," the deejay said. After some stammering, it became apparent that the local deejay had never heard of XTC aside from this one song. It would be a mute point, and I could get over my absolute distain of said radio station, except that the radio station has not altered its rigid format or changed its billboards, which feature Bonnie Raitt, in all of this time. (The Internet keeps me sane.)
Sorry for the poor word choice. I'll be moot now.
Oh, thanks! This song was played over and over again last summer at my house, in my car, on my ipod, etc. I had a bad case of peter pumpkinhead catchiness.
The car is a 1957 Ford Fairlane.
Great song, and yeah, love those guitars!
XTC = Awesome. You should also check out the video for "Mayor Of Simpleton."
"Strongly Inspired" indeed. Perhaps because Andy Partridge (of XTC) co-wrote "King Strut" with Peter? And Peter recorded the original version of "King Strut" in Andy's attic.
It's amazing how much people say and without any knowledge of of what they're saying.
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