4. The Pogues Are For Life, Not Just For Christmas
Apologies if any of my Twitter followers are reading. Its now become customary that when the festive season rolls around, Ill clip on my fluffiest white beard and get kitted out in my best red suit in an attempt to deliver them all with an important gift: the notion that The Pogues are for life, not just for Christmas! And now, Ive travelled further to spread this message. Yes, Fairytale of New York is the greatest Christmas song ever. No questions asked. Its wintry, evocative arrangement captures the essence of the season and its love-hate lyrical dynamic accurately depicts the passions that are so prevalent in the deepest of relationships. But, theres more to The Pogues than just one song. Take for example, their second album, Rum, Sodomy and Lash, whose perfect blend of traditional Irish folk music and raucous punk aesthetics still sounds as original today as it did in 1985. Head Pogue and lyric writer-in-chief, Shane McGowan, may be recognised by the wider listening public as being a reprobate and inebriate (because no successful creative person has EVER taken drugs) but his grasp of language is simply sumptuous. Learned, intelligent and versed in Irish folklore, the toothless one is unafraid of addressing the grittiest of subject matter, whether that be the plight of an immigrant rent boy on the Old Main Drag, the tortured psyches of the wrongly accused on Birmingham Six or the incurable PTSD of a World War One veteran on A Pair of Brown Eyes. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9jbdgZidu8 Unashamedly political, unflinchingly real and musically wondrous, it really is a travesty that The Pogues originality is dwarfed by their mammoth festive hit. You better get re-writing that list to Santa...
A 22 year old English Literature graduate from Birmingham. I am passionate about music, literature and football, in particular, my beloved Aston Villa. Lover of words and consumer of art, music is the very air that I breathe.
