ONE HUNDRED AND ELEVEN SINGLES : #083

aka The Vinyl Villain incorporating Sexy Loser

#083: Red Guitars – ‘Good Technology’ (Self Drive Records ’84)

Dear friends,

the 111 singles box mostly contains of records which I have in my possession for a long time indeed, if I had to guess, I’d reckon this is true for about 60% or so. Then there are quite a few songs which I always loved, but never really had the chance to spend money on. This changed when I quit smoking, I mean: basically you could well say about this box that Lucky Strike’s loss now is your profit, folks!

And then, when the series was already alive, there were a few singles which I chose to replace in favor of other ones, like „hold on, this MUST be included!“. But this became more difficult the deeper I dived into the alphabet, because obviously I could not let those go that had already featured here.

So, to cut a long – and boring – story short, today’s single might probably be the last one that came so late to the party, I mean, we are into the „R’s“ by now, and the chances that I wake up tomorrow in order to (spoiler alert!) replace my song of choice by Leeds’ finest band starting with a „W“ by, say, Ziggy Marley are pretty remote.

So, Red Guitars. The name was always vaguely familiar to me in the early 80s and I think I remember them having had something to do with this Billy Bragg/Paul Weller ‘Red Wedge’ thingy back in 1985. But I don’t know whether they were pro or contra ( I remember The Redskins were contra), and perhaps my memory fails me and they weren’t involved at all, who knows? Those ‘bloody Reds’ were everywhere these days, you really had to be careful – it was all rather confusing!

Either way, it must have been around this time when today’s record came to my attention: their second single and by then already two years old. It’s one of those songs that are always with you, I’d say, always somewhere deep down in the back of your mind, but never really too present – hard to describe, really.

Perhaps this is because the tune is so simple: three chords, a kick drum and a bass unchanging throughout the whole song. Nothing all too spectacular, not really comparable to, for example, „Anarchy In The UK“ really. But, then there are the lyrics, and boy, what lyrics! It’s all there: the power of the internet and social media, environmental catastrophe, reality TV, the fast food industry and an ever more grotesque arms industry:

 

mp3: Red Guitars – Good Technology

And it was written in 1981, although not released before 1983, when there were a mere 100 McDonald’s in the UK. The new technology promised a brighter future for all. Life would be easier. Culture Club were at number one.

Now, 44 years on, and the promise, like many countries, is broken. Public services have been hollowed out to the barest shells. Levels of poverty are unprecedented since Victorian times, people who are working minimum wage jobs are struggling to survive Europe-wide.

Today there are more food banks in the UK than McDonald’s.

Take good care,

 

Dirk