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Song of the day – 89: The School

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Once had myself a great drunken night in Cardiff several years back, in the company of some of the people who play on this record. I can’t recall why I was invited up, but I sure hope no one lost too much money by doing so. Not least among my pleasures was that I finally got to meet the inspirational Vic Godard, and spend time in the company of Liz, the singer here. At the time, she was fronting The Loves alongside Simon (who provided last-minute crazed musical back-up for my own performance), a band I felt were the “ultimate college band experience” or something (not intended as a put down).

This School song recalls Tracey Ullman’s ‘They Don’t Know’, never a bad thing: and taps into the same deep-rooted love of 60s girl group pop and that Phil Spector drum sound… in fact, wait a second, haven’t I already written about this song once already?

On pink vinyl, and who hasn’t wanted to be in The Ronettes once in their lifetime? And who hasn’t wanted to be Tracey Ullman wanting to be in The Ronettes at least once in their bedroom (‘They Don’t Know’, to be precise)? (This is not a slag: I am keeping my Ullman vinyl — keeping it, I tell you!) It doesn’t hurt that main Schoolgirl is Liz, formerly of Yeah Yeah Yeahs-championed Welsh 60s-heads The Loves, and that Liz is the sort of girl that everyone locally (and further a-field) has a crush on. Actually, the entire band is crush-worthy (in a bearded Swedish indie-kid way)…. you can totally understand why twee label par excellence Elefant are releasing this. Perhaps I’m only revealing my own roots in C86 when I talk about how much I adore this, but it’s on pink vinyl! Pink vinyl, I tell you!


Well. At least I’m consistent, if a little confused, as one of the reasons I’m making this Song Of The Day is because The School’s debut album Loveless Unbeliever is being released in Australia, and this single came out around three years back. Oh, whatever. It’s still a mightily lovable sob of pop.

P.S. The photograph is courtesy of my old mucker, the talented Alison Wonderland.

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