The Top Ten Fat Songs

The news keeps telling us we're living through an Obesity Epidemic. Britain and the USA are the worst offenders - apparently half the UK will be clinically obese by the year 2030.

Personally, I think if your weight is making you miserable, or affecting your day-to-day health... then do something about it. But if you're happy as you are - well, life's too short not to have that extra helping of pudding. You might be hit by a bus tomorrow. And the more padding you have, the more chance of survival.

Here's 10 songs to help you celebrate letting your belt out one more notch...

10. The Fat Boys & Chubby Checker - The Twist

(From 'The Best Of The Fat Boys'.)

Everyone laughed at The Fat Boys, but the Fat Boys had the last laugh when they became a huge success with their humorous rapping and human beatbox performances. Sadly, one of the Fat Boys died of a heart attack aged only 28. The other two appear to have slimmed down a little since then.

9. Chris Difford - Fat As A Fiddle

(From 'The Last Temptation Of Chris'.)

Now I have tits just like my mum
I'm out breath before I run
I like to eat because it's fun
But it comes at such a price.

I'm on the old brown rice and the herbal tea for the greater part of me.

If ever there were any doubt that Chris Difford is one of our greatest living lyricists...

8. Black Grape - Fat Neck

(From 'It's Great When You're Straight ... Yeah'.)

I dunno, I reckon if I had Shaun Ryder telling me I had a fat neck - I mean, Shaun Ryder! - that'd probably send me down Weightwatchers. The government ought to appoint him as Minister For Health. He'd sort out the obesity epidemic quick smart.

7. Babybird - 45 & Fat

(From 'Ugly Beautiful'.)

I'm working on my middle-aged spread so that in a few years time I can adopt this as my theme song. Pizza for tea last night - fish and chips for lunch today!

Stephen Jones claims here that he'll "sing about love until he's 45 and fat". He must have changed his mind, otherwise he'd have quit three years back. Phew!

6. Fats Domino - The Fat Man

(From 'Greatest Hits: Walking To New Orleans'.)

They call him the Fat Man - 'cos he weighs 200 pounds
But all the girls love him, 'cos he knows his way around

I bet Cee Lo Green can sympathise...

5. Queen - Fat Bottomed Girls

(From 'Jazz'.)

There were those who accused Queen of sexism back when this record was released in 1978. Oh yes, those enlightened ultra-pc days of the 70s! Compared to the likes of Sir Mixalot, Freddie and the gang's attitude now seems tame and quaint. Also - Freddie Mercury: sexist? Puh-lease.

4. Bad Manners - Lip Up, Fatty

(From 'Bad Manners'.)

Ah, Buster Bloodvessel. The world's unlikeliest pop star. The history of pop just wouldn't be the same without his boiler-suited girth. OK, Buster, you can put your tongue away now. Please.

3. Carter The Unstoppable Sex Machine - Sheriff Fatman

(From 'Straw Donkey: the Singles'.)

Someone call up Roger Cook and The United Nations!

2. Morrissey - You're The One For Me, Fatty

(From 'Your Arsenal'.)

Say what you want about Morrissey, but he knows his fanbase. He knows its made up of the lonely, the unpretty, the people who feel they don't quite belong, the freaks and geeks. (Hey, I should know.) And just as he reached out and put his arms around the wheelchair-bound "monster" spawned in November, here he gives a big hug to everyone who knows that Some Girls Are Bigger Than Others. For someone who hates the human race as much as Morrissey appears to, he's a mass of contradictions.

1. The Beautiful South - Perfect 10

(From 'Quench'.)

Here's a healthy response to the weight issue, from Paul Heaton and Jacqui Abbott...

If he's extra large - well, I'm in charge

I can work this thing on top

And if he's XXL - well, what the hell?

Every penny doesn't fit the slot

The anorexic chicks - the model 6...

Don't hold no weight with me

Well 8 or 9, yeah, that's just fine

I like to hold something I can see

It's obviously a subject close to Heaton's waistline as he released his debut solo album 'Fat Chance' under the pseudonym 'Biscuit Boy'.



OK, put down that cake and tell me your favourite fat song in the comments... and while you're getting interactive, don't forget to vote in this week's Title Fight - which is your favourite 'Drive' song?

Top Ten Boring Songs

"We're so sick of your Top Tens, Rol - they're so BORING!

Boring...!? I'll show you boring!

10. Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin - Boring Fountain ( From Pershing)

The name of this band is Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin. There song may be boring - but with a name like that, who cares?

9. Cracker - My Life Is Totally Boring Without You ( From Cracker - Gentleman's Blues [Us Import])

Aw, you're just saying that.

8. Modest Mouse - Space Travel Is Boring ( From This Is a Long Drive)

Then you must be doing it wrong.

7. Los Campesinos - Romance Is Boring ( From Romance Is Boring)

Then you must be doing it wrong.

6. Ballboy - Sex Is Boring ( From A Guide for Daylight Hours)

Then you must be doing it wrong... or far more than the rest of us.

Take me back to your room
Tie me up and strip me naked
And lie me on your floor
And then you’ll see that sex is boring with me
It’s not what I came here for

5. Paul Westerberg - Boring Enormous ( From Stereo/Mono)

If your life is enormously boring, maybe you need a Replacement.

4. The Pierces - Boring ( From Thirteen Tales of Love and Revenge)

Sexy boy
Girl on girl
Menage a trois
Boring.
Marijuana
Cocaine
Heroin
Boring.

Wow. Some people are hard to please.

3. The Beautiful South - I Love You (But You're Boring) ( From Welcome To The Beautiful South)

Sadly, this rare BS track isn't available on youtube... though you might check out its sister song: I Hate You (But You're Interesting).

2. Pink - Boring ( From Funhouse)

There are many words we might use to describe Pink... boring is not one of them.

1. Pet Shop Boys - Being Boring ( From Ultimate)

Ah, Chris and Neil - you could never be boring to me.

I came across a cache of old photos
And invitations to teenage parties
"Dress in white" one said, with quotations
From someone's wife, a famous writer
In the nineteen-twenties
When you're young you find inspiration
In anyone who's ever gone
And opened up a closing door
She said: "We were never feeling bored"




So... what's your favourite boring song? (No 'bored' songs allowed - I'm saving those for a separate list.)

Top Thirteen Ghost Songs

I celebrated Halloween earlier this week with my Top Twenty Horror Films, but I also wanted to do something to mark the day itself so I started collecting ghost songs with the aim of compiling a Top Ten. Then I realised there were more than 10 essential ghost songs, so I bumped it up to 13 in honour of the day. As mentioned previously, I'm a supreme triskaidekaphobic, but this is the one day of the year that such bad luck cancels itself out. You remember how on Buffy, no self-respecting vamp or ghoul would be seen dead causing trouble on Halloween? It's the same principle.

Even with 13 positions in my Top Ten, I still had to leave out a bunch of great ghost songs, including haunted offerings by Aimee Mann, Gene, Tom Waits, Prefab Sprout, the Manics, Richard Thompson, The White Stripes and others. Not to mention Cherry Ghost, the Ghosts and Phil... Spector.

If you're interested in Ghost Rider songs, I suggest you click here.




13. The Beautiful South - Woman In The Wall

A man murders his wife and plasters her into the bedroom wall... but the wife gets her revenge, driving him mad with ghostly screams and a wall that drips blood. If only all relationships were that simple.

12. Orange Juice - What Presence?

In the moth eaten gloom of his shabby room, Edwyn Collins sees the strangest manifestiation...

It may just be his imagination.

11. The Smiths - A Rush And A Push And The Land Is Ours

In which Morrissey becomes the Ghost of Troubled Joe, hung by his pretty white neck some 18 months ago, then travels to a mystical time zone...

There's too much caffeine in your bloodstream
And a lack of real spice in your life

Yeah, man, I know how that goes...

10. Stan Ridgway - Camouflage

In which a young soldier in Vietnam is saved from an ambush by an awfully big marine who cries "Semper Fi!" and then turns out to have died the previous evening.

He was an awfully strange marine.

9. Bruce Springsteen - The Ghost Of Tom Joad

In which Bruce calls upon the spirit of Steinbeck's classic hero to stand up for the disenfranchised of modern day America. Not so much a ghost story as a requiem for an age long gone...

8. Godley & Creme - Under Your Thumb

A man takes refuge from a storm in the last compartment of a stationary train... but someone follows him on board... the spirit of a woman whose only escape from an oppressive relationship was to take her own life...

7. Laura Marling - Ghosts

These are just ghosts that broke my heart before I met you.

6. Jellyfish - The Ghost At Number One

I will defend Jellyfish as a great 90s rock-pop institution, but on reflection the lyrics to this song are very silly.

5. Ray Parker Jr. - Ghostbusters

I ain't 'fraid of no ghosts

4. John Leyton - Johnny Remember Me

Joe Meek's finest 2 minutes 38 seconds?

One of many so-called "death discs" from the 60s (see also Leader Of The Pack, Dead Man's Curve, Last Kiss et al. ... I've got a whole album of them at home), although this is one of the few wherein the crash victim comes back, with haunting consequences.

3. R Dean Taylor - There's A Ghost In My House

Another rave from the grave by Holland Dozier Holland.

See also The Fall's version.

2. Kate Bush - Wuthering Heights

Heathcliff - it's me, Cathy, I've come home... let me in your window...

1. The Specials - Ghost Town

Not a town full of ghosts, but a town that's a ghost of its former self... this is still one of the spookiest records you'll ever hear...

Paul Heaton Spills The Acid

"I worked it out the other day," says Paul Heaton. "Since 1986, there have been 19 Mercury Music Prizes, 189* Q Awards, 350* Brit Awards..." etc. etc. (*I don't remember the exact numbers, but I wouldn't be surprised if the ones quoted by Heaton were accurate) "...and what have I won? Fuck all. I'd have more chance of winning a Mobo!"

The by now veteran singer-songwriter is half-joking with his audience in Manchester on Friday night, but only half. And he's got every right to be pissed off when everyone from Robbie Williams to Kula Shaker has walked away with armfuls of awards from the various music biz schmoozathons over the last 25 years, yet an artist who's been part of two Number One-selling groups, one half of the most successful British songwriting duo since Lennon & McCartney, and a critically acclaimed solo songwriter to boot... all he's got on his mantelpiece is dust. Oh wait, I just checked, The Beautiful South won Best Video in 1991. So that's all right then.

There are no Beautiful South songs in Heaton's solo set - the truth behind their split remains a mystery - but he has spiced it up from the last time I saw him solo with a welcome selection of Housemartins favourites, including a timeless Build, We're Not Deep, and a roof-raising Me & The Farmer. There's also a strong selection from his last solo album The Cross-Eyed Rambler - though nothing from its long-forgotten predecessor Fat Chance (by "Biscuit Boy") - and his typically acerbic new record Acid Country, which takes a while, but is a definite grower.

Never mind the lack of awards, Friday night was sold out and everyone at the Academy loved Paul Heaton. He knows it too, and is suitably appreciative, thanking us for our support over the years. Besides, a little bitterness becomes him - a more content man wouldn't ever write songs like this...