Tune Tag #34 with Mark Nash of "Joy in the Journey," Pt. 2: Kraftwerk, Velvet Revolver, Brandi Carlile, Elton John, Shooter Jennings, The Jam, Nils Lofgren
Prog to country to new wave....and, beyond! Tune Tag travels far and wide to cover the popular-music landscape....in fact, we cover so much land, it should even impress a perennial hiker like Mark!
Hey, mark………Mark!…………M A R K!!
Wag Tag Sweet Pug Tag! You’re It!
Tune Tag welcomes back the shiny, new Substack entry, Joy in the Journey, and its accomplished navigator,
! His entertaining ‘Stack can be enjoyed and subscribed to by clicking here!According to Mark, Joy in the Journey is “A newsletter about the joys I find or create along the way, through music, through hiking, through learning to live life on life’s terms. One song at a time, one hike at a time, one day at a time!”
Mark was born and raised in Bermuda, a British Overseas Territory, and attended university in Canada starting in 1989. We first met Mark back in September, with:
Last week’s Tune Tag featured
of The Abbey: The Beatles Reimagined, and can be found by clicking here. Next week, join us, when our guest will be , a self-described “family man and all-around rascal” from New England! His A. Hellene Author can be enjoyed and subscribed to by clicking here.
Mark’s Song #1 sent to Brad: Kraftwerk, “The Model,” 1978
Mark’s rationale: For some reason, I’d had Kraftwerk’s “The Model” running around in my head for a week or two, and it was still playing when I decided to reach out to Brad for our second round of Tune Tag. I was ten years old on a family trip to the UK when I bought this, and it was one of a small batch of singles I came home with.
It stands as one of the first singles I ever bought with my own money. I’m interested to see where Brad goes from here.
Brad’s #1 song sent to Mark: Bruce Woolley & The Camera Club, “Video Killed the Radio Star,” 1979
Mark’s response: Well I’ll be!! I always assumed that The Buggles (above link) were the first band to release this song! In fact, I’ve never heard of Bruce Woolley or his Camera Club. I have to say, if given a choice, I’d take The Buggles’ version over this one, familiarity, in this case, breeding preference. Trevor Horn of Buggles fame, and one of the songwriters of the track, has previously name-checked Kraftwerk as an influence, so I’m assuming that’s the connection Brad’s drawing upon.
“I loved Kraftwerk, but they had a very dinky sound then,” Horn recently told Vulture.com. “I wanted to see if I could take that idea and put it in the mainstream so that normal people could hear these machines. Actually, on ‘Video Killed the Radio Star,’ there isn’t a sequencer on it. It’s all played by hand, but in a way so that people said, ‘It sounds like a fookin’ machine!’ We would always say, ‘That’s what we want!’”
Brad’s rationale: Kind of a rare thematic link, here: Recorded just two years prior to “The Model,” the model’s friend, the camera, is the link here, with the far more famous Buggles song, here in its original form by the co-composer, Bruce Woolley. Buggles members, Geoff Downes and Trevor Horn also contributed as songwriters. Woolley’s was released in June 1979, with The Buggles’ version dropping three months later. Woolley’s produced by Mike Hurst.
Mark’s song #2: The Jam, “Town Called Malice,” 1982
Brad’s response: From their 1982 The Gift album, “Town Called Malice” was produced by Peter Wilson and The Jam. The engineer at George Martin’s AIR Studios for The Gift was David Woolley, who may or may not have been related to Bruce Woolley, but the surnames are identical!
Mark’s rationale: I’m digging deep into my bag of song connection tricks with this one: connection by way of TV series. My wife and I just finished watching a thoroughly enjoyable British crime thriller on Sky Max which included a couple scenes of various members of the protagonist Lord family singing “Video Killed The Radio Star,” in what is clearly some sort of family tradition.
That show, A Town Called Malice (promo shot shown above), is set in the ‘80s, and has a stunning soundtrack that’ll take you right back to that bright and brash era. My second selection, The Jam’s “Town Called Malice,” closes out Episode One. If you have a chance to catch the show, Martha Plimpton’s pitch-perfect London accent, alone, is worth the price of admission. The action and the music will keep you coming back for more.
Brad remembers: “A Town Called Malice,” the song, also played a key, memorable role in 2000’s Billy Elliot, starring Jamie Bell (some explicit language):
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