nah, downtown lights is the obvious pop song here - been covered by rod stewart, annie lennox, even keane have done a version xp
― Rae Kwoniff (NickB), Monday, 3 October 2016 17:05 (seven years ago) link
We had it at record club a few years ago.
https://devonrecordclub.com/2013/02/04/the-blue-nile-hats-round-45-toms-selection/
Rob's reaction was interesting...he doesn't like late period Talk Talk either and, whilst they are not all that similar sonically, there's something about the purity of the sound that I guess is anathema to his ears.
I went for Saturday Night but could have picked any of the seven (seven track albums are always fantastic!).
― yugi ex, Monday, 3 October 2016 17:06 (seven years ago) link
Isn't 'let's go out tonight' the most pop song in here?― ✖✖✖ (Moka), Monday, October 3, 2016 12:48 PM (seventeen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
― ✖✖✖ (Moka), Monday, October 3, 2016 12:48 PM (seventeen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
I don't know, maybe. I always thought Headlights on the Parade was the poppiest
― Iago Galdston, Monday, 3 October 2016 17:07 (seven years ago) link
what i never heard of flags and fences!I have been saving the book about them (Nileism) for the right moment.― I wish you could see my home. It's... it's so... exciting (Jon not Jon), Monday, October 3, 2016
I have been saving the book about them (Nileism) for the right moment.
― I wish you could see my home. It's... it's so... exciting (Jon not Jon), Monday, October 3, 2016
It's OK, rather prosaic considering how much a good writer could rhapsodize about them
― Iago Galdston, Monday, 3 October 2016 17:08 (seven years ago) link
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=arOG2_QG4ls
― Iago Galdston, Monday, 3 October 2016 17:10 (seven years ago) link
found an OG pristine vinyl copy of this for $1 a few months ago, pretty ridic what slips through the cracks sometimes.
― nomar, Monday, 3 October 2016 17:11 (seven years ago) link
still find it cheap at carboot sales here too, rubbing shoulders with chris rea et al
― Rae Kwoniff (NickB), Monday, 3 October 2016 17:16 (seven years ago) link
yeah same here, have been jamming it for the past few days. whatever past discussion there's been of it on ILM has somehow slipped by me for the decade i've been here― ciderpress, Monday, October 3
Me three.
― the tightening is plateauing (Le Bateau Ivre), Monday, 3 October 2016 17:34 (seven years ago) link
xpost to scik mouthy
it's hard to make a nuts and bolts case for an affinity between late talk talk and blue nile but i will say that the paul buchanan solo album is the only record that reminds me of the mark hollis solo album at all.
― I wish you could see my home. It's... it's so... exciting (Jon not Jon), Monday, 3 October 2016 17:36 (seven years ago) link
^^ more than enough to get me interested. Only heard abt Blue Nile's album through ilx last week, and Hollis was on my mind frequently.
― the tightening is plateauing (Le Bateau Ivre), Monday, 3 October 2016 17:40 (seven years ago) link
album is called Mid Air
― I wish you could see my home. It's... it's so... exciting (Jon not Jon), Monday, 3 October 2016 17:50 (seven years ago) link
Listened to the title track of that and it reminded me of Lewis - L'amour
― Evan, Monday, 3 October 2016 17:52 (seven years ago) link
"Seven A.M." because it goes down a storm with just about any combination of Sade's "Make Some Room," the dub mix of Mr. Fingers' "What About This Love," M.E./Virgo's "School Hall," and the Arthur Baker "Rapid Eye" remix of Will Downing's "In My Dreams."
― Andy K, Monday, 3 October 2016 18:07 (seven years ago) link
saturday night/quarter to five/when the storefronts are closed in paradise/meet me outside the cherry light
― flopson, Monday, 3 October 2016 18:08 (seven years ago) link
I love the meticulous productions of Talk Talk and David Sylvian's solo work, but I've never got on with The Blue Nile. I can't deny that the production on this record is great, but whenever I've listened to it I've often found my attention wavering very quickly. 'Let's Go Out Tonight' is a great example of a song that I switch off from long before the end.
― pen pineapple apple pen (Turrican), Monday, 3 October 2016 18:32 (seven years ago) link
― Evan, Monday, October 3, 2016 7:52 PM (thirty-three minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
Ok wow...
George Costanza: "If this is a lie, if this is a joke, if this is your idea of some cute little game, we're finished ...
― the tightening is plateauing (Le Bateau Ivre), Monday, 3 October 2016 18:33 (seven years ago) link
:(
― Evan, Monday, 3 October 2016 18:49 (seven years ago) link
At the office through laptop speakers so maybe that is a dumb comparison.
― Evan, Monday, 3 October 2016 18:52 (seven years ago) link
For example I thought those were synth pads behind his voice and piano. Realizing they're not.
― Evan, Monday, 3 October 2016 18:54 (seven years ago) link
Saturday night obv
― Listen to my homeboy Fantano (D-40), Monday, 3 October 2016 18:55 (seven years ago) link
yup
― flopson, Monday, 3 October 2016 18:57 (seven years ago) link
yeah "saturday night" is the one that i've been most obsessed with, when the strings come in a little over halfway through the song it's just game over, music doesn't get much better than that
― k3vin k., Monday, 3 October 2016 19:00 (seven years ago) link
"From A Late Night Train" is imo as sublime as it gets
― Master of Treacle, Monday, 3 October 2016 19:03 (seven years ago) link
reminds me of Aztec Camera!
― seafaring funnyman Jacques Custos (rip van wanko), Monday, 3 October 2016 19:04 (seven years ago) link
not exactly my bag in general, but will say the singer reminds me a bit of Adrian Belew
― Dominique, Monday, 3 October 2016 19:05 (seven years ago) link
Noooooooooo
― I wish you could see my home. It's... it's so... exciting (Jon not Jon), Monday, 3 October 2016 19:06 (seven years ago) link
I would have thought that Let's Go Out Tonight might be a front-runner, but from the comments, maybe not. Anyway, it gets my vote, but all are great.
A lot of people seem to prefer the Craig Armstrong cover (on which Buchanan sings), but I think Hats remains the definitive version. Second place goes to Isaac Hayes version…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3vuy0QJ0BA
― Bloody Snail, Monday, 3 October 2016 19:49 (seven years ago) link
Evan, all I meant was I want you to be right. I want it to sound like Lewis. And it does. Nothing dumb about it.
― the tightening is plateauing (Le Bateau Ivre), Monday, 3 October 2016 19:52 (seven years ago) link
Oh, totally misread you then! I'm often a little too worried about offending those who are closer to an artist than I am. New to the Blue Nile myself but liked that solo track much more.
― Evan, Monday, 3 October 2016 19:58 (seven years ago) link
dude holy shit that isaac hayes cover of "let's go out tonight" !!
― k3vin k., Monday, 3 October 2016 20:32 (seven years ago) link
― Evan, Monday, October 3, 2016 9:58 PM (fifty-six minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
Can't say I was too clear with Seinfeld reference tbh. Just really, really wished your Lewis reference was on point. And it was.
― the tightening is plateauing (Le Bateau Ivre), Monday, 3 October 2016 20:56 (seven years ago) link
― k3vin k., Monday, October 3, 2016 7:00 PM (two hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
yeah I was coming here to say that "saturday night" has the slightest of edges because the string refrain from the 3 and half minute mark is like two lovers walking towards each other on a city bridge.
also it's my "song i would sing on Idol or equiv" song.
― Tim F, Monday, 3 October 2016 21:18 (seven years ago) link
"saturday night" is my vote
― who is extremely unqualified to review this pop album (BradNelson), Monday, 3 October 2016 21:40 (seven years ago) link
http://www.primlifestyles.com/wp-content/plugins/RSSPoster_PRO/cache/c9820_Beyonce-Formation-4.gif
― k3vin k., Monday, 3 October 2016 21:41 (seven years ago) link
most inexplicable discovery from the 5 favorite albums thread, never heard of this, had no idea so many people held it so dear.― flappy bird, Monday, October 3, 2016 12:31 PM (twenty-two minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink
ya me neither
― marcos, Monday, 3 October 2016 21:43 (seven years ago) link
shouts out to my favorite lyric ever though: "in love we're all the same / we're walking down an empty street"
― who is extremely unqualified to review this pop album (BradNelson), Monday, 3 October 2016 21:45 (seven years ago) link
god that isaac hayes cover
― savvinesslessness (map), Monday, 3 October 2016 21:57 (seven years ago) link
this album was a big deal in my house growing up. My mother is the kind of woman who buys a CD every year - Will Young, Daniel Bedingfield, Ronan Keating - and her then-partner was a Britpop man who also loved dance music. But they both would say this is their favourite album of all time.
― boxedjoy, Monday, 3 October 2016 22:15 (seven years ago) link
I've probably said this before in any number of ILX posts over the years, but one thing that really stands out about The Blue Nile is the reverent or hymnal quality of their songwriting and production, the sense that the songs are gesturing toward something much larger than the band and their private concerns; certainly these songs never feel autobiographical (regardless of whether they in fact are or not, and notwithstanding the recurrent sonic and lyrical motifs which form the group's indelible imprint).
It's rare to find music so personal, so singular, that is not also idiosyncratic in the strong sense of that word, not irrevocably bound up with the personality of its creator(s). Certainly when I think about 80s pop it feels like a lot of material falls on either side of that line, either deeply personal or thoroughly universal; The Blue Nile's songs feel like a communication from one frame of reference to the other.
Kate Bush produced two songs which also walk this tightrope, I think ("Running Up That Hill", "This Woman's Work"). But only two.
With The Blue Nile it's just what they do.
Which is one reason why the band is so routinely covered by other artists relative to their general obscurity.
― Tim F, Monday, 3 October 2016 22:27 (seven years ago) link
so much perfect music in one sentence
― boxedjoy, Monday, 3 October 2016 22:37 (seven years ago) link
yeah i would pay ten dollars just to sit somewhere and hear that run, and i'm really poor.
― savvinesslessness (map), Monday, 3 October 2016 22:39 (seven years ago) link
Booming post Tim
That reverent spirit is probably what triggers thoughts of a kinship with talk talk.
Also the feeling of longing which is so distilled it becomes religious and romantic at the same time
― I wish you could see my home. It's... it's so... exciting (Jon not Jon), Monday, 3 October 2016 22:41 (seven years ago) link
yep, and it's romance of a religious order, something you walk through with its own weather and texture, a weighted experience. every feeling almost having an architectural significance, as if they were individual buildings in a city you're walking through
a lot of this is in the form of address of buchanan's lyrics; it's never really a monologue, it mostly seems to be one end of a conversation, whether he's having that conversation with a person or the feeling of that person
― who is extremely unqualified to review this pop album (BradNelson), Monday, 3 October 2016 23:01 (seven years ago) link
with this framing it's a lot less jarring that peace at last ended up being often literally devotional
― who is extremely unqualified to review this pop album (BradNelson), Tuesday, 4 October 2016 00:58 (seven years ago) link
Was jamming "Sentimental Man" this morning.
― Tim F, Tuesday, 4 October 2016 01:05 (seven years ago) link
the last minute of "downtown lights" :O
― k3vin k.
Yeah, this is one of my favourite moments in music. The way he sings, "I'm tired of crying on the stairs" and then belts out the title gets me every single time.
― Kitchen Person, Tuesday, 4 October 2016 02:08 (seven years ago) link
buchanan's latest solo album has some really great lyrics. he's still very much an interesting lyricist.
― Heez, Tuesday, 4 October 2016 02:26 (seven years ago) link
Are you talking about Mid Air or did the new one come out?
― I wish you could see my home. It's... it's so... exciting (Jon not Jon), Tuesday, 4 October 2016 02:53 (seven years ago) link
yeah mid air
― Heez, Tuesday, 4 October 2016 02:53 (seven years ago) link
Went with 'The Downtown Lights' but holy hell what a ridiculously difficult choice.
― Austin, Tuesday, 4 October 2016 02:58 (seven years ago) link
For the 'things that sound a bit like Blue Nile': I think Epic Soundtracks has aesthetic similarities anyway, but his Good Things album seems particularly apposite.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joz9SigJ6eg
― The shard-borne beetle with his drowsy hums (Chinaski), Sunday, 22 July 2018 13:30 (five years ago) link
sometimes wonder why the Hats thread isn't just always on the front page.
― Hmmmmm (jamiesummerz), Monday, 13 September 2021 20:59 (two years ago) link
mods, make it so
― k3vin k., Monday, 13 September 2021 21:04 (two years ago) link
official album of ilm
― ciderpress, Monday, 13 September 2021 21:07 (two years ago) link
Hats belong on top naturally
― Evan, Monday, 13 September 2021 21:08 (two years ago) link
Re-reading this thread always makes me feel happy
― Tim F, Monday, 13 September 2021 21:14 (two years ago) link
This was posted on the C or D thread in case anyone missed it (re-released this year and available on streaming services)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DOJ9QcVXZzE
― groovypanda, Tuesday, 14 September 2021 07:01 (two years ago) link
i listened to hats tonight knowing it might be my last late night jog of summer and i can't imagine listening to it at, like, 6pm in the coming months. it's been the first album i've confidently called my favorite album ever made since probably high school, and i only discovered it in 2018, and it's an album i've actually listened to less this year as i've been consciously trying to revisit old favorites while doing my new favorite activity of "moving my body", but damn if isn't the greatest thing ever made every time i go back to it
― Clay, Tuesday, 14 September 2021 11:45 (two years ago) link
one of us!
― k3vin k., Tuesday, 14 September 2021 12:10 (two years ago) link
I find it hard to imagine jogging to any song apart from "Downtown Lights" but more power to you!
― Vinnie, Tuesday, 14 September 2021 12:48 (two years ago) link
Thought that was Jordan:The Comeback.
― Dan Worsley, Tuesday, 14 September 2021 12:55 (two years ago) link
great album for a walk in the rain
― corrs unplugged, Wednesday, 19 October 2022 09:21 (one year ago) link
a walk across the raindrops
― ( X '____' )/ (zappi), Wednesday, 19 October 2022 09:31 (one year ago) link
this such a great comedown album
― J0rdan S., Sunday, 1 January 2023 21:03 (one year ago) link
i wish there was a 12 min long mix of “saturday night”
the final two minutes of "headlights on the parade" rivals anything on this album for me
― J0rdan S., Sunday, 1 January 2023 21:23 (one year ago) link
i found a mint condition copy of this on cassette at a record store in london last week, made me very happy
― J0rdan S., Sunday, 1 January 2023 21:24 (one year ago) link
one of us! one of us!
― k3vin k., Monday, 2 January 2023 00:18 (one year ago) link
this has become one of those albums I don't actually have to listen to to get killed by it, I just have to think about it
― J Edgar Noothgrush (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Monday, 2 January 2023 00:47 (one year ago) link
otm
― i'd rather do music and chill tf out (Austin), Monday, 2 January 2023 01:01 (one year ago) link
I tend to want more "From a Late Night Train" and "Family Life" from this band rather than the usual lite funk, though I guess one of the things that makes those tracks special is that they are uniquely spare.
― Halfway there but for you, Monday, 2 January 2023 18:06 (one year ago) link
may I direct you to his solo album
― k3vin k., Monday, 2 January 2023 19:17 (one year ago) link
Caution: challops ahead.
"I Want to Know What Love Is" by Foreigner would make a pretty good Blue Nile song.
― Hideous Lump, Tuesday, 3 January 2023 06:15 (one year ago) link
No.
― doug watson, Tuesday, 3 January 2023 11:17 (one year ago) link
even if you stripped it down enough i don't think it'd be restrained enough
― ufo, Tuesday, 3 January 2023 11:27 (one year ago) link
I can hear it but lyrically no.
― J Edgar Noothgrush (Joan Crawford Loves Chachi), Tuesday, 3 January 2023 12:41 (one year ago) link
Do we have a thread for songs that could be off Hats?
― bain4z, Tuesday, 3 January 2023 13:04 (one year ago) link
'The Lady in Red' :0
― Piedie Gimbel, Tuesday, 3 January 2023 13:06 (one year ago) link
― J0rdan S., Sunday, January 1, 2023 4:03 PM (three days ago) bookmarkflaglink
Whenever I listen to Hats it's the album plus "Saturday Night" two more times
― J. Sam, Wednesday, 4 January 2023 22:40 (one year ago) link
oh man
― ufo, Saturday, 20 January 2024 12:01 (four months ago) link
^^ had a surreal moment when that came on the radio in a cafe near Sagrada Familia while the sun was setting circa 1999. looking at Gaudi's architecture bathed in a golden glow while this unfamiliar slooooow version of a familiar song played, it felt like my brain was melting.(being slightly tipsy didn't help.)
― ( X '____' )/ (zappi), Saturday, 20 January 2024 12:10 (four months ago) link
Is that a marimba? For someone who nails the late night lethargy of the song, adding that is like throwing in slide whistle or a saw. It's a 10, but ...
― the body of a spider... (scampering alpaca), Saturday, 20 January 2024 23:29 (four months ago) link
an aside: atmospheric slide whistle new fav micro-genre
― she fell asleep with her hand around my throat (Austin), Sunday, 21 January 2024 00:18 (four months ago) link
"it's the poor man's pedal steel"
sorry. as you were.
but yeah, didn't know about this cover. pretty reminiscent of his classic sidelong makeovers of burt bacharach.
ofc i had to look it up and it originates as a b side from a uk only single. nice.
― she fell asleep with her hand around my throat (Austin), Sunday, 21 January 2024 00:28 (four months ago) link
2024 - could this be the year the long-rumored complete second Paul Buchanan album releases?
― the body of a spider... (scampering alpaca), Sunday, 21 January 2024 01:31 (four months ago) link
new song — Paul Buchanan - Mid Air (The Blue Nile)
― truly humbled underdog (k3vin k.), Saturday, 27 January 2024 22:20 (four months ago) link