London You're A Lady

[Irish Rover]

Rainy Night in Soho was played on my wedding this year.

Good choice Eckhard. Lovely song

[pogues23]

To me one of Shane finest moments. A rare bird and a perfect way to finish the album of Peace and Love. Shane very own geographical tribute to the fair city, combines classic elements of Poguerty (accordion, tin whistle, and cittern,) overtop of Steve Lillywhite's marvelous production. Some might call in overproduced, I myself call it brilliance

[James]

Some might call in overproduced, I myself call it brilliance

You see, to me, the fact that you've mentioned the production makes it a less-than-great job. With albums that I really 100% totally enjoy, you just don't notice the producer. Just a band firing on all cylinders. No doubt, the producer had to capture this well and layer and mix a track in the right way (and therefore his/her contribution is incalculable to the end product) but I guess if I was producing a song I'd want people to think "What a brilliant band.", rather than "What a brilliant producer." Then the work would be done.

[Rich]

I'm with pogues23 -- this is one of my all-time favorite Pogues tracks. I love the arrangement, the instrumentation, and the melody. I think the big, bright sound suits the track, and the last 1 min 10 sec or so are pure sonic bliss.

Also LYAL deserves special accolades because it's the only song in the world I always play air cymbal to, no matter where I am when I'm listening to it.

[philipchevron]

I'm with pogues23 -- this is one of my all-time favorite Pogues tracks. I love the arrangement, the instrumentation, and the melody. I think the big, bright sound suits the track, and the last 1 min 10 sec or so are pure sonic bliss.

Also LYAL deserves special accolades because it's the only song in the world I always play air cymbal to, no matter where I am when I'm listening to it.

Some might call the last 1 min 10 sec (or so) overproduced. I call it a superb piece of planxty scoring by Peadar O'Riada, whose dad Sean was pretty good at this kind of thing also.

[CM]

The song was aired in Cardiff last Xmas, maybe it'll make a comeback, I gather Shane attempted to get it on celluloid in the Libertine, but the editors had other ideas.

Highlight of the Cardiff show was a belting Fairytale with Cerys Matthews, a great gal for the job. A siren with attitude, well able to go ten rounds at the mike with Shane. The one who was on the TV Download who's name escapes me didn't quite cut the mustard.

Dream Fairytale duet: Janis Joplin, though with a larynx like hers she might have to sing Shane's part and he'd have to sing hers

Nightmare Fairytale duet: Shane MacGowan and James Blunt.

In other news (very) unconfirmed rumours that Shane performed for the faithful last night at a well-known north london hostelry

[GuinnessDrinker]

Nightmare Fairytale duet: Shane MacGowan and James Blunt.

In a recent poll of "most annoying things" on NTL,James Blunt reached the giddy heights of Number 4 - being deemed more annoying than stepping in dog poo

[Zuzana]

In other news (very) unconfirmed rumours that Shane performed for the faithful last night at a well-known north london hostelry

Yep, Mr Dickon Edwards spotted him too. Relevant bits (more in Dickon's blog):

"Evening - a heady night at the Boogaloo. I install myself - Lucifer-like - at the side of Mr MacGowan at the bar. He’s smoking ‘Sweet Afton’ cigarettes, which are named after a Burns poem and feature the poet on the box, but are actually an Irish brand.
(...)
Babyshambles play a two-set secret gig. (...) Mr MacGowan - who remains at the bar all night except to join Babyshambles in a rendition of ‘Dirty Old Town’ - tells me he’s worried that his rare video copy of Mr Anger’s Scorpio Rising might be snaffled, as he left it in the upstairs sitting room. It’s not the famous ones he doesn’t trust, or the friends of the famous ones. It’s the friends of the friends of the famous ones. The hangers-on of the hangers-on. So I go upstairs to move the tape to a safer location."

(OK, this IS off-topic in this particular forum. But since it was mentioned here... )

[dawsonn]

When people say over produced what does this actually mean? Does the producer just keep on producing it way past a time when he/she could stop?
id say the first two albums are under produced and the last few are just right.

[Beisty]

I think opinions will always differ on that one.

Sometimes you want a producer to do very little to the recordings so that the finishes result is raw and personal (see Johny Cash - any of the American Recordings albums).

I think the production RRFM was basic, but suited the Pogues at that time. RSATL in my opinion was a tad weak. Elvis Costello definately did not bring out the best of those songs. It is a credit to the Pogues song writing and musicianship that the album is so highly regarded. Disagree? Compare Dirty Old Town, Sick Bed, Sally et al on the album with their live versions.

IISFFGWG was spot on perfect. Yeah, I know some people did not like all the multi layered post propduction, but it gave real depth to the music and made the band presentable to a more mainstream market that was in desperate need of musical education (record companies were investing heavily is pre-fabricated music at the time).

Peace and Love was more of the same, although when listening to it you get the impression that suits in the background wer epiling on the pressure for commercial success, which may be apparent is some of Steve Lillywhites production efforts.

Hell's Ditch was the Holy Grail for me. Pefect production balance between rough and smooth. Joe did one hell of a job, just wish he had been able to produce RSATL.

[Behans Ghost]

I may be stating the obvious here, but after recent rediscovery of this song, I have to say that it is an often overlooked gem! Typically beautiful work from Shane, and personally i thing its great how he marks the changes in London, mentioninig acid house and punk etc, without the song ever losing its timeless quality! Certainly a firm entry in my top 20 Macgowan songs!Def up there with A Pair of Brown Eyes as an example of Shanes poetic gifts.

End of rant

[aljaM]

I love this song too!!!
i can't think of a better way to describe ones view of a city. Really a fantastic piece of art!