I’ve gotten a bit lazy with the full on Classic Album Reviews lately, so today I’m giving you a truncated version by doing a classic song review. I might do this with a few forgotten songs.
Action Painting! was a Sarah Records band coming out of Brighton that is apparently unworthy of even a Wikipedia page. Sarah Records is yet another anomaly demonstrating the superior tastes of the late 80’s U.K., probably best known for being the label that launched The Field Mice. I don’t think that Action Painting! ever released a full-length before disintegrating into mysterious musical spores, but These Things Happen is a residual of my mid-90’s mix tape trading days (Mark’s recent post about the evolution of sound mediums prompted me to remember what a big part of my life these once were). In 1995 and 1996 I had one of those goofy personal Geocities deals where I would talk about band I liked and shows I’d been to (a 15-year precursor to the blogs of today that I think a lot of bored kids imbibed in).
Little did I know, the thirst for taste comradery was rampant. Not just amongst dumb teenagers like myself, but amongst older people too (again, the widespread use of MP3 sharing has changed all that). People started emailing me asking to tape trade, and message boards were full of people wanting to do the same. Making a first mix tape for someone you don’t know is really just a shot in the dark, but after a few rounds, would become a refined exchange. You get a handle and feel for what someone might like, and you’re usually right. It’s a musical pen pal program, and unbeknownst to me at the time, would become have huge impact in shaping my tastes. Maybe it’s because there was more of a “here you go” pretext instead of a hard flog. Action Painting! was on one of these tapes along with bands like Sea & Cake, Orange Juice, Husker Du, Mission of Burma, Galaxie 500, Slowdive, the Go-Betweens, American Music Club, Greg Sage and the Wipers, and Half String. For the record, the guy who gave me the best series of tapes was a linguistics professor in Scotland.
What makes These Things Happen a classic song? It has a bright shininess that never seems to fade, and is in that category of songs that I can listen to around 20 consecutive times on repeat and still never ever tire of. There is a crystal clear simplicity I hear in the music that has nothing to do with the lyrics (which could lump it into that category of apology love songs)…it’s an uncomplicated little composition with some sweet acoustic guitar strumming, but is elegant just the same.
Have to listen here.