mp3: Nothing To Be Done
no longer updated website: The Pastels

This always reminds me of someone at university, who will remain nameless, but was terribly self-conscious and cool-conscious the whole time I knew him, always making sure everyone knew what he was listening to, why he was listening to it and why it was important we knew why he was listening to it. So imagine my shock when finally getting round to listening to something he recommended that wasn’t Pearl Jam (The Daily Mail had caught on by this point - Grunge kids don’t have meals! They eat pizza!) or the Loveless-era drear of My Bloody Valentine, and it actually being good; I wasn’t sure what to do.

I only know a little about The Pastels, which is actually illegal in Glasgow and can result in being barred from Sleazy’s, but I think I can get away with it to an international audience.

What a sweet song. In a way, it’s almost too sweet, sickly mellow, as someone else I didn’t like from university, used to say. No, I didn’t like anyone much at university. 1993 was a funny year; we stayed in a flat with no radiators (which meant I walked about with a hot water bottle round my neck, like some elderly Flavor Flav), watched the crowds come and go to the Rangers games down the road, and had a direct view of the linedancers leaving the Grand Ol’ Opry across the road every Friday. My flatmate’s bedroom skylight looked directly onto a huge stone angel on the roof of the restaurant building opposite, which would cause all sorts of perturbation for the first few months when it was in the corner of your eye. This song whisks me back there immediately: so what you say, we go and get a beer?

Buy.