Singles Going Steady

Certain Songs #1393: Buzzcocks – “Everybody’s Happy Nowadays”

December 7, 2018 by Jim Connelly

Album: Singles Going Steady
Year: 1979

Figured that in the wake of Pete Shelley’s sudden and saddening death, I might write about a couple more of his Buzzcocks songs in the next couple of days. And then a couple of his solo songs when I get there (as I was going to do anyways), so here’s yet another highlight from Singles Going Steady, the mold-breaking “Everybody’s Happy Nowadays.”

One of the things that struck me about the Buzzcocks was that their albums were more experimental than their singles, and so I never loved the artsier first two albums Another Music in a Different Kitchen and Love Bites as I did Singles Going Steady or even A Different Kind of Tension, which is where I think they found the balance between punk pop and punk art.

Certain Songs #153: Buzzcocks – “Why Can’t I Touch It?”

April 5, 2015 by Jim Connelly

Album: Singles Going Steady
Year: 1979

Totally influenced by reggae – Steve Garvey’s huge bass line is the driver of the entire song – but not sounding a lick like it, the stellar b-side (to “Everybody’s Happy Nowadays”) “Why Can’t I Touch It?” is my favorite song on Singles Going Steady.

Like so many great Buzzcocks songs, “Why Can’t I Touch It?” lyrically has one thing on its mind:

Well it seems so real I can see it
And it seems so real I can feel it
And it seems so real I can taste it
And it seems so real I can hear it
So whyyyyyyyyyyyyy-yyyyyyyyyyy-yyyyyyyyyy can’t I touch it?
So whyyyyyyyyyyyyy-yyyyyyyyyyy-yyyyyyyyyy can’t I touch it?

That’s pretty much the extent of the words: Pete Shelley only has four senses working overtime, when he needs the fifth for ecstasy. But this song isn’t really about the words, it’s about the big groovy beat that Garvey & John Maher create and what the guitars of Shelley & Steve Diggle do over that beat.

In between those verses all of that frustration that Shelley is singing about gets worked out via their battling guitars. Pete’s in one speaker & Steve is in the other, and those guitars tease, taunt, circle each other, shove, back away, fight. retreat, and generally perform an exquisite lover’s dance.

You can almost see Shelley & Diggle staring each other down in the studio during this song, each one daring the other to try something else until Maher just says “fuck it” and ends the song. At 6:31, “Why Can’t I Touch It” seems like it ends wayyy too soon. Why maybe is why Shelley couldn’t touch it in the first place.

“Why Can’t I Touch It?

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Certain Songs #152: Buzzcocks – “Ever Fallen in Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve)”

April 4, 2015 by Jim Connelly

Album: Singles Going Steady
Year: 1978

It’s either late 1980 or early 1981, and I’m feeling depressed about something or other. Probably an unrequited crush, because that could have been my major at Fresno City College. So I decided to do what I did then: go to Tower Records.

In this particular case, I didn’t know what I was looking for. But I knew that I wanted to try something that I’d never ever heard even a note of, and I knew that it had to be punk or post-punk, as I was slowily – with the great help of Trouser Press, Musician and Creem (since this was back during the time that music blogs were known as “magazines”) – working my way through the more critically-acclaimed music of the late 70s & early 80s.

And – I actually remember this – I remember telling myself that maybe the Buzzcocks compilation with the cool cover was the right combination of new and familiar to snap me out of my doldrums. Said compilation, of course, was the now-immortal Singles Going Steady.

And, yeah, my doldrums were snapped before I’d even flipped the album over. How could it not be?

Look, I know that it’s a singles compilation, and therefore shouldn’t “count,” but fuck that: Singles Going Steady is as unified sounding as any album ever and doubles as an amazing greatest hits, to boot. Pete Shelley knew what he wanted to say, he and Steve Diggle knew how they wanted it to sound, and along with crack rhythm section of Steve Garvey & John Maher, they applied that knowledge for 16 gloriously prescient punk-pop songs..

And the most glorious (of the A-sides) (barely, over “Orgasm Addict” and “Everybody’s Happy Nowadays”) is probably the best-known: “Ever Fallen in Love (With Some You Shouldn’t’ve)” is simultneously as perfect as punk rock gets and as perfect as pop music gets. The verses are dominated up by dueling guitars and chattering drums, while the chorus builds and builds and builds, breaking up the title phrase into a zillion different pieces.

Ever fallen in love
with someone
Ever fallen in love
in love
with someone
Ever fallen in love
(loooooooooooooooooooovvvvvvvvve)
in love
with someone
you shouldn’t’ve fallen in love with?

Well yeah. And of course, it’s so universal that it actually just barely missed the top 10 in the U.K., thereby making suspicious everybody who didn’t understand why not only you could have a huge pop song with big punk rock guitars, but why you should have a huge pop song with big punk rock guitars.

Not here of course. Not for decades, but the sonic template was set right here, with the Buzzcocks.

“Ever Fallen in Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve)”

“Ever Fallen in Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve)” performed live in 1978

“Ever Fallen in Love (With Someone You Shouldn’t’ve)” performed live in 2016

The Certain Songs Database
A filterable, searchable & sortable somewhat up to date database with links to every “Certain Song” post I’ve ever written.

Check it out!

Certain Songs Spotify playlist
(It’s recommended that you listen to this on Spotify as their embed only has 200 songs.)

Support “Certain Songs” with a donation on Patreon
Go to my Patreon page