While trawling charity shops on the English south coast (it
might have been appropriately Help the Aged), I came across Robin Scott's Life Class. As a mint as a Polo and
signed by the musician, a double CD for the princely price of £1.99. I guess
that previous browsers weren't aware that Robin Scott once had a group – or an
alter ego – called M. Or maybe they knew this and therefore gave it a wide
berth.
Pop music is not everyone's cup of tea, but there's something
so seductive, so warm and cosy about the best. And Robin Scott, or M, has often
come up with some very good pop music. Which is why he should not be confused
in any shape or size with Matthieu Chédid, a French singer who also calls
himself M, but adds a dash either side to avoid too much confusion (as in -M-):
a plagiaristic transgression for which the man should be soundly guillotined.
Coincidentally, both have dabbled too with African projects. French -M- did
something in Bamako's renowned Studio Bogolan, which does slightly cheapen an
otherwise fairly flawless Bogolan Music
boxed set. British M recorded with Shikisha, a trio of female vocalists from
South Africa, on Jive Shikisha, an
album from 1983 that is one of the most joyful, danceable and surprising EurAfrican
collaborations you are ever likely to hear.
Life Class sent
me scurrying back to 1979's New York
London Paris Munich ('everybody's talkin' 'bout... pop muzik') – which I
bought on the strength of 'Pop Muzik', one of the cleverest pop songs ever to
hit number 2 in the UK and number 1 in the States. ('Dance in the super
mart/Dig it in the fast lane/Listen to the countdown/They're playin' our song
again...') In fact, Scott was probably too clever for his own good and there's
an air of pastiche about his music that probably stalled his career and prevented
him reaching the dizzy heights of fellow art school graduates like David Byrne,
Brian Eno, Keith Richards, Pete Townshend and David Bowie. It's indicative that
the back cover of the album is a quadrant of portraits of Albert Einstein with prominent
tongue (not for once in cheek) as if screen-printed by Andy Warhol.
Nor is it surely any accident that during the album's
recording in a studio in Montreux, a temporary resident of the Swiss town, who
was probably still recovering from his addled Thin White Duke period, came
along to contribute some hand claps on a song I haven't yet identified. Yes it's all very knowing and very
referential, in the way of Scott's fellow Croydon graduate, Malcolm MacLaren,
but it's also very good. The album yielded two other (lesser) hits in the first
two tracks of Side 2: 'Moonlight and Muzak', a delicious hummable tune awash
with melodic synthesisers, and the irresistible 'That's the Way the Money
Goes', which reprises the territory of 'Pop Muzik' at a jauntier tempo.
Scott lived and
worked in London and Paris at various times and it wouldn't surprise me if he
also spent time in Munich and New York. He brings the ironic humour of the
London scene and a sense of smart New York street-cool to the album's signature
Euro-disco feel. There's an element of Kraftwerk in there, too, and he clearly
likes the idea of himself as a kind of disciplinarian Teutonic master of
ceremonies. On the fabulous 'Made in Munich', his girlfriend of the time does
much of the singing, while Scott barks out the dance steps as if through a
megaphone like some kind of dystopian square-bashing caller. 'Do not resist!'
he commands in a cartoon Germanic accent – even though it's fairly impossible
to do so anyway.
While there's no
one significant lyrical theme on the album, Mr. Scott definitely had a penchant
for spies, paranoia and the Cold War. On 'Moonlight and Muzak', he encounters
'a Cold War baby from behind the Iron Curtain' with whom he thinks they made
contact but cannot be certain. And hidden away among my 7" singles is a
copy of a later minor M hit, 'Official Secrets' ('fiction or fact?').
'Marching, marching to the music/Music, music made in Munich...' It's all good fun and it probably adds up to Robin Scott's finest hour. Well, it would be hard to top something like 'Pop Muzik'. It's little surprise that among the other clever-clogs that Scott would work with – including documentary film-maker, Julien Temple, and ex-Japan collaborator, Ryuichi Sakomoto – was one Thomas Dolby, whose 'She Blinded me with Science' seems cut from a similar arty-farty pop fabric. Jive Shikisha aside, much of Robin Scott's work is funny, frivolous and ultimately somewhat flimsy. I bought New York London Paris Munich over 40 years ago, but I still like it. I still listen to it without prejudice and bracket it with pop music like the Chiffons' 'He's So Fine' and the Shangri-Las' 'Leader of the Pack': if it is fluff, then it's rather glorious fluff. 'Shooby dooby do-wah, wah wah, pop pop shoo-wah...'
