Tag Archives: someone

#1241: They Might Be Giants – Someone Keeps Moving My Chair

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‘Someone Keeps Moving My Chair’ opens up the second half of They Might Be Giants’ album Flood, their brand-new record for 1990. My honest opinion, out of the first four LPs by the band featuring just the two Johns playing everything bar the rhythm section, Flood is maybe my least favourite. But it’s still really, really good. I just happen to like fewer songs from there compared to those from the other three. But when the songs are great on Flood, they’re instantaneous likes. At least they were to me, as was the case for today’s song in the hot seat.

‘…My Chair’ is a John Linnell-led TMBG composition and, in his words, “notes the exaggerated importance of petty concerns when everything else is going haywire.” And to lay this notion out, the song is a tale about a Mr. Horrible who seems to be idly going about his day while unnamed characters are desperately trying to get him to talk to ‘the ugliness men’ who are the phone. These no-names are intentionally attempting to annoy Mr. Horrible, being all up in his face, asking him a bunch of inane questions. But their antics are of no matter to Mr. Horrible, because the thing that’s really on his mind and taking up his time is that somebody insists on moving his chair behind his back. And there’s the ‘petty concern’ Linnell refers to.

The tune’s a lively, upbeat number, featuring one of John Linnell’s more nasally vocal performances which add so much character to the proceedings. The words and delivery wouldn’t hit as hard without that aspect of his voice. Same for all the others songs he takes the lead on. There’s something about those opening keyboard chords that make the track sound fixed in its time. Reminds me of some backing music to a ’90s shopping mall advert or montage in a TV show. I’m convinced that the guitar rundown during the “Mr. Horrible says I don’t mind…” part is lifted from Bruce Springsteen’s ‘Thunder Road’. But that doesn’t affect my enthusiasm for the song. You get the melody and the quality, all in a matter of 2-and-a-half minutes. It’s a good time.

#612: The Beatles – If I Needed Someone

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George Harrison was listening to The Byrds’ take of the old folksong ‘The Bells of Rhymney’ one day and took particular interest in the track’s main guitar riff that starts it off and appears every now and again throughout. Liking it so much he decided to use it in one of his own songs that would appear on the next Beatles album. He did send the track to the Byrds thanking them; they were more than thrilled with the result. ‘If I Needed Someone’ was released alongside thirteen other tracks on Rubber Soul nearing Christmas 1965, and was another of Harrison’s compositions that showed his growing maturation as a songwriter.

The song’s prominent jangly guitars was further inspired by the sound The Byrds had pretty much created earlier in the year though the track has The Beatles’ stamp all over it, with soaring three-part harmony vocals and a strong rhythm section featuring a weaving bass guitar line courtesy of Paul McCartney. Harrison stated that the song was a simple love message to his then girlfriend Pattie Boyd who he’d met during the filming of A Hard Day’s Night. A lot of people think it’s about having a sidechick – to put it simply. There are a lot of valid reasons as to why by just reading the lyrics. It’s nothing to get too caught up about though. With the position they were in at the time, they could write about anything.

I assume that ‘If I Needed Someone’ was moderately popular within the group as it was the only Harrison song to be performed live by them before they stopped touring in 1966. George would obviously go on to write many more great songs but at that time… it was most definitely the best one he had put down on paper.