Before POLLywood - The Go-Betweens - Artist Poll #98 - VOTING THREAD

"Quiet Heart" and "Streets of Your Town" are McLennan, right?

Yep. Most of their best known '80s singles were McLennan, I guess. Notable exceptions being "Spring Rain", "Head Full of Steam" and "Part Company". Being a Forster person -- if I did have to choose -- I now feel the need to point out that this is not the same thing as "their best '80s songs".

Speaking of which, people have seen The Best Promo Video Ever right?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3HufrsUMIBA

Fun facts: 75 different tracks have received votes so far. The number voters at this stage is still pretty modest, such that three moderately weighted votes is enough to get a track into the top 30. Later voters can still make a huge difference to the outcome this time.

Yeah, i always thought that the Head Full of Steam video goes a long way towards explaining why they never broke out to a bigger audience.

Anyway, entry submitted.
Highest ranking song which I discovered because of this poll = "The Clock"

Highest ranking song which I discovered because of this poll = "The Clock"

― enochroot

The Clock is one of my favourites. One of the best choruses of all time.

gonna submit a ballot, just torturing myself with the ordering.

do you accept mixed ballots?

I suppose a mixed ballot would be okay. With the balance from 517 distributed evenly in the second section.

What's the deadline? Go-Betweens are my favorite band but I've been slammed at work and non-work. Trying to do a solo records ballot too but it's taking some time to brush up.

Any time through to the first half next week would be good. I'm happy to wait a bit if it means a bigger pool of voters.

I'm going to get mine in soon. Been listening quite a bit

Meanwhile I'll lobby for things that haven't been mentioned. :)

The aborted Beserkley single with whathisname from the Apartments adding guitar:

https://youtu.be/0NjbFFSqiV0

Okay, the ambient rollout is likely to finish on Tuesday. Not keen on a rollout here until at least Wednesday [GMT+10] in that case. Feel free to tinker with ballots until then and I'll check how people are going when I wake on Wed morning.

Really appreciate you extending the deadline. I made my 30 Go-Betweens songs into a playlist and listened to it a few times this week. I'm happy with my picks (for now). The harder part is the solo material. I prefer Robert's solo stuff on the whole, but I just played In Your Bright Ray and there were at least five songs that could make my list.

I voted for multiple Ray tracks myself, which seemed improbable a little while ago. And, without giving much away, I certainly haven't been alone.

BUMP! Final days. Everything must go, etc, etc.

Any love for this one? It eventually became a 16LL-era b-side but this 1985 BBC recording is largely responsible for its place on my ballot. McLennan is a bit shoutier here and it's more obviously Morrison playing rather than a drum machine.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=im_rZY8jbSw

^ Janice Long session was actually recorded 9/4/86, he says, pre-empting the fact-checkers.

I would totes pay money for a proper, comprehensive, all-in-the-one-place ...at the BBC-type release. (Consider: http://go-betweens.net/gb/gbbbc.htm )

Ballot sent. Ranked but I didn't add the numbers myself as I remember Gukbe once saying it made doing the spreadsheet more fiddly.

(can send again with the 1-30 numbers if you have a different data entry technique)

No, that's fab! Cheers!

I’ll fire in a ballot too - will just do GB’s as I don’t feel I’ve listened to the solo stuff enough for a meaningful contribution.

should be able to get a ballot in by weds!

I love "Casanova's..."!

You should definitely vote then! :)

(You clearly should anyway. The solo sub-poll needs your grasp of that material, at the very least. Hehe.)

Almost made my poll, only removed relatively late on in the process.

Just re-listening to Forster's Inferno from earlier this year. I wasn't that keen on the single, but the rest of it is really lovely. I'll definitely be voting for a couple of tracks in the solo works poll.

I'll Look After You in particular is a really beautiful track.

Submitted!

will do so in an hour

Voted!

Thanks for the emails overnight [Melb time], by the way. Total number of votes is starting to look rather good now. I'll collate and acknowledge receipt in the next few hours.

Incidentally, if any emails over the last few weeks were met with an eerie silence then something may have gone wrong.

I also should reiterate that, with the ambient rollout still choogling along, there's plenty of time left if you're still deliberating.

sent!

Gonna get a ballot together tomorrow, somehow

me too!

BUMP!

Scrolling up, there are quite few people early in the thread I've not heard from, ballot-wise. There is still time. You know you wanna! :)

just submitted, could've tinkered forever.

Sent!!

Far too late for effective lobbying, but here's another relatively obscure McLennan contribution that's on my ballot. (Possibly the last chance to mention it as I doubt we'll see in the rollout. LOL) As far as I can tell, this went completely unheard until the '00s reissues. Which is a shame because, for one thing, the middle eight does weird things to my brain.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BZhBWaqqZ8

Oh that's a gem, it'll be on my ballot too. It amazes me this and Newton Told Me got discarded while songs like Slow Slow Music made it onto records. How good an album could Spring Hill Fair have been otherwise?!

I didn't have time to listen to more than two of their albums so I'll just be following the results rather than voting. But I am getting better at telling their voices apart so there's that. Forster seems more pitchy

XP:

Okay, setlist.fm suggests they played it live at least twice in late '83. So not completely unheard. #FactCheck

I almost said the same thing re "Slow Slow Music"!

'Pitchy' is not unfair, I'd say. :)

I don't even mean it pejoratively - I like a lot of singers with character like that

The Evangelist was well-represented in my solo ballot.

I don't think it's too much of a spoiler to say that you have a fair bit of company in that part of my spreadsheet.

Yeah, my list was very Evangelist heavy. It was hard not to vote for every song from it.

As you said upthread, it's a special record.

Will send a ballot tomorrow... life has been getting in the way

Cool. 20-something seems a respectable voter pool. I think we're a whisker under that at this instant, with several still promised.

Sorry - I will get mine in tomorrow!

voted :)