Top Ten Mars Songs

Our next stop on my musical journey into space is Earth's closest neighbour, the red planet. Watch out for little green men... and the God of War.

10. The Boss Martians featuring Iggy Pop - Mars Is For Martians

'Nuff said.

9. Grinderman - Honey Bee (Let's Fly To Mars)

So that's what happened to all the bees - Nick Cave took 'em to Mars! One of the less obscene Grinderman records.

8. The Flaming Lips - Take Meta Mars

Somebody please take Wayne Coyne to Mars before he puts anymore heads in jars. Taken from the album In a Priest Driven Ambulance (With Silver Sunshine Stares), this was allegedly inspired by the Can song Mushroom. Or maybe just some mushrooms.

7. The Wedding Present - Mars Sparkles Down On Me

There's a new Wedding Present album out, in case you haven't heard. This is from their last one. Both are brilliant.

6. T. Rex - Ballrooms of Mars

Bob Dylan knows
And I bet Alan Freed did
There are things in night
That are better not to behold

5. The Undertones - Mars Bar

OK, so it might not be the planet... but it does help Feargal work, rest and play. And it's a perfect reminder of how supremely ACE The Undertones were.

4. Jeff Wayne - The Eve of the War

No one would have believed the top comment on youtube for this song...

I will play this on 21st December, 2012.

WHO WILL JOIN ME?

TOGETHER, LET US USHER IN THE APOCALYPSE.

No, dude, but I'll play it on the 22nd in your honour.

3. Ash - Girl From Mars

And she never told him her name...

2. David Bowie - Life On Mars?

Look, it may be a godawful small affair, but Bowie's already had one Number One on this journey and I very much doubt it's the last we'll hear from him. Let's give someone else a chance at the top position...

1. John Grant - Marz

John Grant's spelling might need a little work, but his songwriting is out of this world.

Golden champagne juicy grapefruit lucky Monday
High school footall hot fudge buffalo tulip sundae
Almond caramel frappe pineapple rootbeer
Black and white pennyapple Henry Ford sweetheart maple tea

So. Those were my favourite Martians... what are yours?

Top Ten Spaceship Songs

My musical exploration of space continues.

You may be wondering how I'm planning on getting up into the stars? Here's ten modes of interstellar transportation I considered...

10. The Rezillos - Flying Saucer Attack

Laser beams and gamma projectors
There'll be nothing on earth to protect us
When they arrive out of the sky
They'll be frying us alive

I think I'll wait for the next bus.

9. Def Leppard - Rocket

Oh, come on, you know you don't mean that. It's only Def Leppard. Calm down. Who wouldn't want to go into space with poodle-rockers from Sheffield and a one-armed drummer?

8. Starship - Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now

They started out as a Jefferson Airplane, but that wasn't going to be Slick enough to get them into space. Becoming a Starship rocketed them to the top of the charts.

Heh. DJ puns. They could have been my life.

7. The Wedding Present - Flying Saucer

Dave Gedge has been collecting rusty old spacecraft for years. He also has a Rocket (though sadly you can't hear that on youtube).

6. Suicide - Rocket USA

If flying saucers ever did invade earth, this would be the perfect song to accompany their otherworldly attack. Deeply unsettling, even though it's actually got very little to do with space travel.

5. Peter Parker - Swallow The Rockets

The name of this band is Peter Parker. 'Nuff said.

If I had to go into space, I'd want Peter Parker as my co-pilot. Obviously.

4. Julian Cope - Spacehopper

Julian Cope may well be singing about the orange children's toy with hang-on ears... but I like to picture him riding through space on said item. Kind of like the Silver Surfer... but cooler.

3. Billy Bragg - My Flying Saucer

Care of Woody Guthrie, a sad little song about getting deserted by the mothership. Just like ET. Billy Bragg phone home.

2. Elbow - Lippy Kids

The "title" track from 'Build A Rocket, Boys!'

1. The Kinks - Supersonic Rocket Ship

On my supersonic rocket ship
Nobody has to be hip
Nobody needs to be out of sight. Out of sight.
Nobody's gonna travel second class
There'll be equality
And no suppression of minorities. Well alright.
We'll take this planet, shake it round
And turn it upside down.
My supersonic rocket ship.

Ray Davies: astronaut of pop genius.



So, that's my transportation sorted. If you had to go into space on a musical ship... which would you choose?

The Wedding Present Go Bizarro In Holmfirth

Congratulate me, I managed to stand up for a whole gig without too much discomfort. Still some discomfort, but nowhere near how bad I felt when I saw Ash back in April. Maybe the chiropractor is having some effect after all! He reckons I have weak knees which might be adding to the pain in my back when I'm standing. So he's got me wearing knee braces when walking, which are definitely helping manage the pain. Why not try them at a gig? Hey... there might be something to this...

Anyway - The Wedding Present in Holmfirth. There's a trend at the moment towards artists with a certain heritage digging into their back catalogues and performing a classic album all the way through, just as it appeared on record - twenty-odd years later. Never one to miss out on a bandwagon (one of his new songs involves a wife cheating on her husband via iPhone), David Gedge is dragging his latest incarnation of The Wedding Present out on the road to re-present 1989's classic Bizarro - and great it sounds too.

I was disappointed to miss out on the support - particularly when I discovered it was Cinerama. That is, the other name for The Wedding Present. Damn them! (My favourite David Gedge memory is still the Cinerama gig I went to where he was running his own T-shirt stand.) Still, whether my back would have stood up to an extra hour's punishment I'm not sure. It was Bizarro I came to see, and Bizarro I got. After an opening set of new songs and a couple of classics, the repeating voice of John Peel filled the Picturedrome, an edited montage of "The Wedding Present / The Wedding Present / The Wedding Present..." before the great man himself introduced the opening track from beyond the grave. (21 years later, David Gedge is a lot more animated than he was in this video.)

Have you ever seen a bunch of late 30-something / early 40-something blokes moshing? It's a sight to lift your heart. And though I couldn't join in myself (that was never really my scene, even as a younger man with a stronger back), I cheered them on through No!, Thanks, What Have I Said Now, Granadaland and the mammoth, showstopping Take Me! I never saw The Wedding Present back in 1989 - hell, I'd barely even heard of them - but I can't imagine them sounding any better than this. Especially on the song below, perhaps their greatest single... fans of My Favourite Dress may disagree, but as Mr. Gedge was happy to point out, "I think you paid to see the wrong album - you should have come when we did George Best."