150cc of awesome (15 songs from 10cc)

January 9, 2008 4:34 PM

10cc was NOT "The Worst Band in the World", but they played one on TV. And just about every song they recorded that didn't have 'Love' in the title ("I'm Not in..."), tested the limits of '70s Pop Music Oddness, starting with the stand-up/sit-down/doo-wop "Donna" (sitting by the telephone).

"Rubber Bullets" was a snarky response to Elvis' "Jailhouse Rock", and they later revisited the criminal justice system with "Good Morning Judge".

They learned of the joys of unrepentant materialism in "The Dean and I" ("It's a wonderful world when you're rolling in dollars") leading to "The Wall Street Shuffle" and "Art for Art's Sake" (Money For God's Sake). They declared "I Wanna Rule the World" long before Tears for Fears said "Everybody" does.

"I'm Mandy Fly Me" was inspired by the famously sexist airline commercials. They may have been white-boy-reggae-wannabes, but show some respect for "Dreadlock Holiday". Before they were 10cc, they recorded "Neanderthal" under the group name Hotlegs, probably inspiring Jimmy Castor's "Troglodyte".

Still, "Silly Love" should never be confused with McCartney's "Silly Love Songs" (it's okay if you don't click this one). And their later song "Feel the Love" may not be inspired, but the video is.

Oh! Let us not forget that "Life Is a Minnestrone".

posted by wendell (45 comments total)

No, they are not the worst band in the world. But they will never be forgiven for "The Things We Do For Love." For that aural crime, they must at least be in the conversation for worst band...

(Thanks for not linking to that.)
posted by dios at 4:49 PM on January 9, 2008 [1 favorite]

I have a fair bit of 10cc on my iPod. I guess it's mainly for nostalgia's sake: I saw them as the headlining band in the early 80s, and Van Halen was the intro/secondary band. Boy, did the respective fortunes of the two bands diverge from that point onward, and yet, now they're both kind of at the same point once again (washed up). Heh.
posted by jamstigator at 4:49 PM on January 9, 2008

This will 10cc well.

Let's not forget that the driving factor behind 10cc's weirdness was that two of the band's members, and the songwriters behind their odder material, were Godley and Creme.

Here they are performing Under my Thumb, but they also directed videos for Frankie Goes to Hollywood, The Thomson Twins, and Wang Chung.
posted by Astro Zombie at 4:51 PM on January 9, 2008

Lest they be forgotten, 10CC was the beginning for Godley and Creme whose video for "Cry" was pretty damn strange for it's time.

Oh, and: A widely-repeated claim, disputed by King and Godley, but confirmed in a 1988 interview by Creme, is that the band name represented a volume of semen that was more than the average amount ejaculated by men, thus emphasising their potency or prowess.
posted by birdhaus at 4:54 PM on January 9, 2008

Astro Zombie, ya beat me to it!
posted by birdhaus at 4:55 PM on January 9, 2008

Big boys don't cwy. Big boys don't cwy. Big boys don't cwy.
posted by fish tick at 5:08 PM on January 9, 2008

LOLCREME
posted by freshwater_pr0n at 5:22 PM on January 9, 2008 [1 favorite]

This definately qualifies as a "favorite band" post -- but let it be said that the most important member of 10cc was neither Godley nor Creme, but Graham Gouldman, the astounding genius who's compositions include (if my memory serves me correctly) "Bus Stop" and "Look Through Any Window" by the Hollies, "No Milk Today", "Listen People," and "This Door Swings Both Ways" by Herman's Hermits, and quite a few others you might recognize, and (whoa!) "For Your Love" by the Yardbirds (which was so good, that it made Eric Clapton quit the Yardbirds, and embark on the musical crap-a-thon that was the rest of his life). But that's not all, Gouldman also wrote (I've looked it up now), "Pamela Pamela" by Wayne Fontana. And speaking of Wayne Fontana, Eric Stewart of 10cc was also in Fontana's Mindbenders, who recorded the deathless "Game of Love," and the great garage ballad "Groovy Kind of Love" -- for ruining which Phil Collins shuld hung. On top of all this, 10cc actually did put out two stupendous albums, the self-titled and the one with "Wall Street Shuffle," before they started to stink the place up like everybody else in the mid-seventies.
posted by Faze at 6:12 PM on January 9, 2008 [5 favorites]

Thank you Wendell. Leaving out your glaring omission of "Une Nuit a Paris", I'll just sit back and Feel The Benefit.

And I'll argue for hours on end that "Live And Let Live" is one of the best live albums of its time, and still stands up well against anything since.

(What can I say. I'm a child of the 70's... <fires up iTunes>)
posted by Pinback at 6:32 PM on January 9, 2008

They made fantastic film clips

And Godley and Creme invented the gizmo
posted by mattoxic at 6:35 PM on January 9, 2008

I believe this was one of theirs too
posted by mattoxic at 6:38 PM on January 9, 2008

Godley and Creme's video adventures were just as overrated as Michael Nesmith's video wankery.
And I was around when they were released.
They didnt look "groundbreaking" OR "vanguard" so much as they looked tacky, wack and chintzy.

The only time I think it ever sorta worked for them was Blur's clip for "Girls and Boys"

Just because you have access to a crappy blue screen doesnt make you friggin Stan Brakhage.

10cc is rad as nostalgic cheeze though.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 6:49 PM on January 9, 2008 [1 favorite]

Gouldman wrote another Yardbirds mega-hit, 'Heart Full of Soul.' dude was more or less the shit for a while there.

and i take offense to 'I'm Not In Love' not "test[ing] the limits of '70s Pop Music Oddness," how many worldwide hit songs feature a fretless bass solo while the secretary of the recording studio whispers 'big boys don't cry'?
posted by tremspeed at 6:59 PM on January 9, 2008 [1 favorite]

I had no idea...

It's like, if the Music-Mix-a-Robot was fed the discographies of Zappa, Queen, and smooth AM Yacht Rock. It tastes great, but too much will give you a headache.

And now I want a 10cc disco-ball.

Thanks, wendell!

I had no idea...

10cc: now with 5cc more godleyness and creme.
posted by not_on_display at 7:11 PM on January 9, 2008

Don't bother firing up iTunes, well at least the iTunes store, for there isn't much of 10CC on iTunes. lazlo Bane recently covered a couple of 10CC songs, which reminded me of how much I used to love A night in Paris, but alas she is not there. Cest lavie.
posted by Gungho at 7:15 PM on January 9, 2008

And I was around when they were released... don't get more cogent that that folks
posted by mattoxic at 7:23 PM on January 9, 2008

2nd'ing tremspeed a bit - it sucks, but it's not that bad - but 'People In Love' does manage to to show unmistakable 10cc goodness whilst still testing the limits of '70's Pop Music Blandness'

(On preview: no, not the iTunes store. I bought a 10cc "Best Of ..." CD a couple of years ago, and was given a grounding in reality and mortality when the Flirty Young Thing behind the counter said "I've never heard of them - what do they sing?" when I went to pay for it...)
posted by Pinback at 7:24 PM on January 9, 2008

And I was around when they were released... don't get more cogent that that folks

It's not a point of pride.
It's to stave off the inevitable "sure they look dated now, but at the time..."
posted by Senor Cardgage at 7:26 PM on January 9, 2008

Sorry Senor, seemed like you were involved somehow. But as far as late 70's early 80's music clips went, godley/creme's were more interesting than most. Englishmen in New York as an example. Cry is interesting- and dang it all, sure they look dated now, but at the time...
posted by mattoxic at 7:48 PM on January 9, 2008

...your glaring omission of "Une Nuit a Paris"...
I tried, man, I tried, but my Google-fu kept coming up with nothing but the nocturnal emissions of a certain hotel heiress and I had to stop before I went completely blind.

Yes, it was mixing the Pop Music sensitivities of Gouldman and Stewart with the artsy-craftiness of Godley and Creme that made 10cc special in a "you got chocolate in my peanut butterbacon" way. I was also around when all these songs were released and I remember how lonely it was being a 10cc fan in Southern California before "I'm Not in Love". And for someone originally introduced to the band by "Rubber Bullets", "I'm Not" was very tame.

And I'm sure the word Senor Cardgage meant to use to describe the Godley/Creme videos was "wacky", not "wack". But thanks for the idea; my next post will feature Michael Nesmith videos.

(And isn't a guy whose first name is LOL about due for a comeback right now?)
posted by wendell at 8:03 PM on January 9, 2008

Didn't they do that fucking album with Peter Cook doing the interludes, playing all characters in a very strange sort of conceptual album story? I remember listening to it at a friend's house while tripping and being very fucking weirded out. Later I thought I dreamed it, but it was the album where they showcased the gizmo if I recall.
posted by Henry C. Mabuse at 8:06 PM on January 9, 2008

This Godley and Creme video "rocks it", as it were.
posted by Wolof at 8:12 PM on January 9, 2008 [1 favorite]

I came late to 10cc.
which sounds naughtier than it should.
but, yeah, they were a great, adventurous, tuneful band. and "I'm Not In Love" is one of the great singles of all time. (Chrissie Hynde/The Pretenders did a fine cover for the Indecent Proposal soundtrack, btw.)
posted by the sobsister at 8:16 PM on January 9, 2008

I want to go on record by the way as saying that I love Michael Nesmith and his solo records ("Mama Nantucket" is damn near perfect) its just that Im not all that impressed that he used his Liquid Paper/Monkees trust fund to go off and become Gerry Todd.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 8:36 PM on January 9, 2008

Did everyone else in the world (those old enough) think that I'm Not In Love was a Paul McCartney single when they first heard it years ago on the radio? Or was I the only one?
posted by flapjax at midnite at 8:37 PM on January 9, 2008

Too good for a McCartney single. Also too ironic. The guy doesn't have an ironic bone in his body. Well, maybe now.
posted by Henry C. Mabuse at 8:47 PM on January 9, 2008

Thanks heaps Wolof

Rokit ain't my favourite Herbie track, but i certainly enjoyed that.
posted by mattoxic at 8:52 PM on January 9, 2008

MacCartney contributes to the Godley and Creme album Freeze Frame.
posted by mattoxic at 8:53 PM on January 9, 2008

Props to freshwater for the Gouldman enlightenment; I'm old enough to know better but I had no forking idea of his stellar songwriting track record (never did the legwork).

Re: "I'm Not in Love:" Don't shoot the messenger (commercial radio, record labels, etc., ad nauseum are to blame, not the band). Think about it next time you wake up facing your latest one-night-stand.
posted by whozyerdaddy at 9:04 PM on January 9, 2008

I never have that problem with goats.
posted by Henry C. Mabuse at 9:27 PM on January 9, 2008

They didnt look "groundbreaking" OR "vanguard" so much as they looked tacky, wack and chintzy.

I wouldn't go that far. MFA thesis project, perhaps.

Now, tacky, wack, chintzy, AND pretentious? Wrapped Around Your Finger. Which was on MTV about 1.6B times a day in 1984.
posted by dw at 9:39 PM on January 9, 2008

Didn't they do that fucking album with Peter Cook doing the interludes, playing all characters in a very strange sort of conceptual album story? I remember listening to it at a friend's house while tripping and being very fucking weirded out. Later I thought I dreamed it, but it was the album where they showcased the gizmo if I recall.

yes, Consequences. it's a 3-LP set, IIRC. it was originally supposed to be a demonstration disc for the Gizmo(tron) but somehow morphed into one weirdass box set.

i remember the video for 'cry' being one of the funnier Beavis and Butthead bits. i kinda just remember them screaming in horror the entire time.
posted by tremspeed at 9:42 PM on January 9, 2008

Too good for a McCartney single. Also too ironic.

Looking over McCartney's post-Beatle work, I reckon you're right about the "too good" part. Now I'm thinking about the "too ironic" part. That's probably true, too, although I guess Back In The USSR qualifies as a sort of playful irony. Of course, even that is Beatles-era Paul. Anyway, more than I'm Not In Love's lyric content or quality, I was referring simply to the vocal performance, which sounded very Paulish to me when I first heard it many years ago. Still reminds me of McCartney's voice.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 11:10 PM on January 9, 2008

Before they were 10cc, they recorded "Neanderthal" under the group name Hotlegs, probably inspiring Jimmy Castor's "Troglodyte".

Sacrilege! But if it's true, it just goes to show Castor's ability to turn base metal into gold.

I always wanted to hate 10cc because their records always sounded like the most cynical pastiches. But they tended to be redeemed by catchy hooks and sly clever lyrics.

"I love to hear those convicts squeal
It's a shame these slugs ain't real
But we can't have dancin' at the local county jail"

So what if it is just Riot in Cell Block Number 9 crossed with Status Quo? If you're gonna steal, steal from the best.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 12:47 AM on January 10, 2008

Best line from the song...

"We all got balls and brains,
But some got balls and chains..."

...which may have been excised from that TV performance...
posted by wendell at 12:56 AM on January 10, 2008

Oh, Howard Hughes
Did your money make you better?
Are you waiting for the hour
When you can screw me?
'Cos you're big enough
posted by Meatbomb at 1:06 AM on January 10, 2008

"I don't like black men -- oh no,
I fear them.
I don't like black men -- oh no,
I fear them.
But we'll you rip off our forms,
Making black men a joke,
Making millions of bucks,
Buying hookers and coke...

I don't like hookers -- oh no,
I LOVE them..."

Jesus, I'm turning more and more into an archetypal PC Mefite every time I look into the mirror. Does anyone out there have the antidote? Little Green Footballs, perhaps?

Seriously though, Dreadlock Holiday is just one obnoxious song.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 2:14 AM on January 10, 2008

In defense of "Dreadlock Holiday", it struck me as making fun of the white guy's POV, especially in the video, just as "Wall Street Shuffle" makes fun of greed and "I Wanna Rule the World" makes fun of megalomania. Still, those 4 Brits in the band are very very white.
posted by wendell at 2:30 AM on January 10, 2008

In defense of "Dreadlock Holiday", it struck me as making fun of the white guy's POV

I guess you'd have to spend more time listening to the band before you figured that it was irony then. I'm guessing that at that time, back in the mid-seventies, the vast majority of their market wouldn't have been that sophisticated and would have read it as a trip report. I know that I certainly did.
posted by PeterMcDermott at 2:43 AM on January 10, 2008

So what if it is just Riot in Cell Block Number 9 crossed with Status Quo?

Status Quo?

I wouldn't say so. It's nowhere near their standard four to the floor stomp, and, er, don't you think Gouldman might have learned what a totally standard twelve bar bompa-bompa was during his tenure with ye Yardbirds?

ba-chick ba-chick ba-chick ba-chick ba-chick ba-chick ba ba ba

It's a long way where I bin, I guess.
posted by Wolof at 4:42 AM on January 10, 2008

They didnt look "groundbreaking" OR "vanguard" so much as they looked tacky, wack and chintzy.

I remember running across one of those annoying "cartoon lectures" that they (used to?) publish in Spin, opining that the Kaufman brothers and Eisenstein really aren't nearly as interesting or influential on music video as Busby Berkeley, and rightly so. And I remember thinking, "this was written/drawn by someone who was jealous of the fact that all those film-school geeks had actually wasted time watching old Russian silent movies while he was getting high and drunk and listening to the Specials while jerking off to a picture of Jane Weidlin."
posted by lodurr at 4:42 AM on January 10, 2008

Gouldman and Creme are also responsible for the Manchester City song that was recorded in the mid-70s and which the team walks out to.

"City [clap-clap-clap], Manchester City
We are the lads who are playing to win.
City [weird guitar riff]
The boys in blue never give in"

It's unforgivable because, well, it's City.
posted by essexjan at 4:44 AM on January 10, 2008

Oh, and it was the 70s Man City team singing the song, not Gouldman & Creme. Colin Bell, Francis Lee, etc. Which makes it even worse.
posted by essexjan at 4:49 AM on January 10, 2008

For the a cappella backing of 'I'm Not In Love', the group multitracked themselves singing each note of the chromatic scale to a 12-foot tape loop. These were then recorded onto 13 tracks of a 16-track reel, and the band then pushed faders to 'play' chords. [...] [T]here was a piece of gaffer tape across the bottom of the fader paths to stop them ever going to the bottom. That meant we had a chromatic scale sizzling underneath the track all the time, a hiss just like the hum you sometimes hear at a football match when nobody's shouting. If you listen to the opening of the song, where the bass drum beats us in, you will hear a sizzling hum there that continues all the way through the track. We actually created 'hiss' on the track, when we would normally have been fighting to get rid of hiss!

Recording "I'm Not in Love"
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 8:04 AM on January 10, 2008 [2 favorites]

Gouldman did the (surprisingly good) music for Animalympics, too... one of those animated movies that nobody seems to remember, but probably should. Brad Bird did some of the animation, long before his stuff for The Iron Giant and The Incredibles.
posted by vorfeed at 11:00 AM on January 10, 2008