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Someone had put the video for
"Up The Junction" by Squeeze up on Twitter and I had an enjoyable couple of minutes watching and listening and wondering why Squeeze aren't up there as one of the greatest song-writing bands in the world. So many fantastic tunes, so many witty and poetic lyrics. It's not like they've been forgotten, but why didn't they get the credit (I think that) they deserve? I feel the same about Paul Heaton and mentioned this (and Squeeze) in the upcoming RHLSTP I did with him.
The reason can't be because Glen Tilbrook seems to think that women give birth in an incubator, can it? Or be because of the weird time shifting that happens in a few songs. At one point it appears that the song was written on the same day as the baby is born in the incubator "This morning at four fifty, I took her rather nifty" and then suddenly in the next verse that idea is blown out of the water - "And now she's two years older
Her mother's with a soldier"
Did he write the first part of the song on the day of the birth (which would be a pretty inconsiderate thing to do) then put in in a drawer for 24 months and decide to pick it up from there? The comedian Tony Cowards questioned this and I pointed out that I had the same issue with Sk8er Boi by Avril Lavigne (
see why here). He also brought up Billy Bragg singing "I was 21 years when I wrote this song, I'm 22 now but I won't be for long" - a line he nicked from Paul Simon. It's possible he wrote the song when he was 21 but didn't sing it til he was 22 and didn't want to lie so added an extra bit, but I thought that Billy should have to be hones in every future singing of the song, "I was 21 years when I wrote this song, I'm 66 now but I won't be for long" (82 for Simon). Really Billy Bragg should say "I was about six years old when Paul Simon wrote this lyric, I'm 26 now and actually I don't have to credit Paul Simon because the lyric is substantially different now." I don't want to have to think about how the Kirsty Maccoll version should go.
Anyway I thought I'd score some points with Squeeze fans by tweeting the link to the song and asking "Why are Squeeze so underrated?" I'd assume that any fan of Squeeze would be really pleased to have their favourite band credited in a way that they must surely feel they deserved and have the fact that they should be even better known acknowledged.
I was wrong though.
Most Squeeze fans on Twitter seemed to think this was a diss. "They're not underrated. They're amazing," or "Well I certainly rate them." I got so many tweets and none of them were, "Well done for saying it."
Saying something is underrated doesn't mean it's bad or not rated at all. Believe me, I know. I am surely one of the most underrated comedian - rated by some, but definitely not seen for what I am, the best all round comedian of my generation.
Squeeze are clearly a successful band, but my point is that they aren't mentioned in the same breath as the Beatles (also under rated in my opinion) or the Stones (highly overrated) or the Kinks (criminally underrated), even though Squeeze are lyrically superior to those bands and have banged out a huge number of fantastic melodies.
Obviously things being rated correctly or incorrectly is something of a subjective thing, but I think on balance even an impartial observer would think Squeeze were underrated and you'd definitely think a fan of them would think that, just as a fan of anyone would. Believe me, and it's hard to believe, they are Richard Herring fans who would passionately argue in favour of my ludicrous assessment of my own rating. And I wouldn't want them as insane fans if they didn't.
So I was surprised to receive almost universal derision for my question and very few attempts to come up with an answer. One person suggested it might be because their big hits are in very different musical styles and often had different lead singers and there's part of me that thinks that maybe some how the arrangements or choice of instruments sometimes make the otherwise excellent songs lost a little bit of impact (but I know very little). Paul Simon who was 21 years when he wrote that song, but is 82 now but won't be for long, because time hurries on and the leaves that are green turn to brown, did claim that the failure of a couple of his solo albums before Graceland (and I have to say as a Simon fan that those albums were under rated) was down to the rhythm section not being right. But the drums on Up The Junction are great, so fuck off Paul and stop writing songs with time shifting problems in them, OK (sorry for being 60 years late with that advice, but to be fair I wasn't alive when you wrote that song, I'm 57 now but I won't be for long. I don't want to change the world, I'm not looking for a New England, I'm just looking to see why Squeeze (and Hearts and Bones - your best album) are underrated.
