Well my friend Stuart (whom several folks here at PA know who he is) made me a triple CD of John Peel's Festive 50 radio program from 1983 and my mind has been blown, but anyway...would you believe the song featured at #50 (which listeners of Peel's program voted for this chart, see?) was a song by Tom Robinson that I actually LIKED. Yes, for the first time I heard a song by him I actually LIKED. It really showed off his vocal chops, not just another mindless rocker. And it seemed very prescient, about war in fact...it was called "War Baby". So yeah, for the first time I've heard something good by Tom Robinson.eally just fed my brain, talked about his early punk days when he was in a band called Riff Raff (whom I've heard and weren't that great), and how the Clash changed his life, and he even talked about Tom Robinson, that musician that was an out gay man around the time of punk, which was really radical (though I've never appreciated Tom Robinson's music, too conservative rock and roll, rather bland - for those who don't know Robinson he never came across as effeminate or anything, in fact I'd say Freddie Mercury came across more gay than he did).
Now Peel's playing the Cure, "The Walk" AND I FEEL LIKE I'M IN HIGH SCHOOL AGAIN HAHAHA. It's at #49 in the Festive Fifty on John Peel BBC radio. 1983.
And he plays two songs by the Birthday Party in like the first half hour or so and they're BOTH good...just insanity. I get a terrible kick out of John Peel's radio show "Festive 50" chart that the listeners voted on in 1983. I think there's Depeche Mode, too but I can't remember the song.
Also there is a great Elvis Costello song, which is crazy because I rarely appreciate Costello. Leave it to John Peel to take these bands/artists I normally ignore and do something brilliant with one song by them.