Playlist: Scorchio 2

Well, here we are again and it isn't even summer...

Round my way the last few days have been, well, scorchio! At least three of recent days here in southern England, have breached 30°C (86°F) in the day - and barely dipped below 20°C (68°F) at night. Now, that might not be much for many of you, but for us, that is something akin to standing in a volcano.

So here we are with another round of scorchio playlist tunes (90s British sketch show reference for the uninitiated) - we used many of the more obvious tunes last time around, so expect a few more from the fringes this time. Of course very few of these tunes have anything much to do with actual hot weather, but when has that ever stopped us?

Anyway, stay cool everyone!

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1. Hot Hot Heat: Middle Of Nowhere

Okay, the heat bit is in the band name not the song, but this was one of the indie bangers of that year (2005), so in it goes. It was the second single from their second record, Elevator, and while it didn't bother the top end of the charts, it did get a lot of airplay on the radio. It's a catchy little number, with strong hints of the new wave acts like XTC and Elvis Costello, that they grew up admiring.

Middle Of Nowhere (official music video)

2. Buffalo Tom: Summer

Buffalo Tom hail from the Boston rock scene of the mid-80s, meeting at University of Massachusetts - Amherst. They were heavily influenced by post-punk bands like the Replacements and Hüsker Dü, and were friendly with J Mascis of Dinosaur Jr (who also helped produce their first two records). Summer though, came on fifth LP Sleepy Eyed, in 1995, seen by Trouser Press as regaining their status "as everyone's favorite raucously sincere college rockers."

Summer (official music video)

3. Glass Animals: Heat Waves

Photo: NME

This song became something of an enigma for Oxford's Glass Animals. The electro pop track had been written back in 2018, but was put out as a single in June 2020. It was well reviewed - one said it was "built on a delicious groove" - but didn't garner much commercial attention to begin with. But it eventually crept up to number 5 on the UK chart, top spot in Australia, Canada and a few others, and top ten in many more. In the U.S., its progress was even slower; it made it to the top of the Billboard chart - in early 2022, more than a year after release, taking around 60 weeks to make it there, five weeks on the top, and racking up a total of 91 weeks in the chart system (a record for the Hot 100).

Heat Waves (official music video)

4. Red House Painters: Summer Dress

The Red House Painters formed in Atlanta, moved to San Francisco and eventually signed to 4AD. Summer Dress comes from fourth record, 1995s Ocean Beach, the last to include one of the founders Gordon Meck, and also the last on 4AD. It saw the band move from the longer, droning songs of earlier albums, towards something slightly at the folkier (and shorter) end of the sphere.

Summer Dress (audio only)

5. Pavement: Summer Babe

Summer Babe represents the one and only single on the Drag City label by everyone's favourite 90s slacker rock kings, Pavement, before they moved to Matador Records. They used a slightly different mix of it for their debut album, Slanted and Enchanted - giving it the (Winter Version) suffix. Pitchfork seemed to think it is a good reflection of Stephen Malkmus doing a "balancing act between the court jester and the savant." It was seen to be a brave move to open with the "Ice baby" just two years after Vanilla Ice's notoriously awful Ice Ice Baby.

Summer Babe (rare video, shot on 16mm / Super 8, from 1992)

6. Guided By Voices: Hot Freaks

Okay, maybe not specifically (or even remotely) about heat or summer, but it has the word hot in it, and I like GBV, so it's in. Hot Freaks was a co-write between the two lynch-pins of early GBV, the always prolific Robert Pollard and their coordinator in chief, the delightfully named Tobin Sprout. Bee Thousand is considered by many long-term fans to be one of their finest, and is well flavoured with the sound of the 60s British Invasion and a bit of psychedelia. The song itself is a typical for Pollard, where he appears to have thrown a grenade into the dictionary and pieced random words back together. Hot Freaks the title, rather than being a view on weird people in the summer, is, according to Pollard, a nonsensical bit of rock terminology he invented, to make a catchy refrain.

Hot Freaks (live in Dayton, OH, 1996)

7. Violent Femmes: Blister In The Sun

While vocalist and guitarist Gordon Gano wrote the song, the great signature drum lick was provided by founding member and drummer Victor DeLorenzo. They would play cafes and busk on street corners in their native Milwaukee, until one day in 1981, James Honeyman-Scott of the Pretenders saw them playing outside the Oriental Theatre, where his band would be playing later that day - he liked them and Chrissie Hynde got them in to play a short set after the official support band had played.

Blister In The Sun (live in Munich, 1986)

8. Bananarama: Cruel Summer

While perhaps not as famous (or infamous) on the 80s pop songwriting / production scene as Messrs Stock, Aitken & Waterman, Steve Jolley and Tony Swain (who met on set working at The Muppet Show) had more than their fare share of big chart hits. There were production and songwriting credits including Just An Illusion for Imagination, the True album for Spandau Ballet and Alf for Alison Moyet - and this one. It was initially a Top 10 hit in the UK in 1983, and when it was included in The Karate Kid the following year, it hit the Billboard Top 10 too.

Cruel Summer (official music video)

9. Bruce Springsteen: I'm On Fire

Photo: Ebet Roberts / Redferns

Although Born in the U.S.A. didn't come out until 1985, the first round of sessions for it date back as far as January 1982. And I'm On Fire was from one of those early stints, with both album and single versions being laid down at The Power Station in May 1982. It came together quickly; as Springsteen picked out a slow tune on his guitar, drummer Max Weinberg and keyboardist Roy Bittan worked around quickly, to effectively come up with the moody number that became a hit a few years later.

I'm On Fire (official music video)

10. The Beach Boys: Warmth Of The Sun

The title is perhaps an understatement at the moment (at least where I am), as it is less 'warmth' and more flaming, melting, intense heat. Anyways, no playlist about warm / hot summery weather can be complete without the Beach Boys. Warmth of the Sun first cropped up as the B-Side of Dance, Dance, Dance and on Shut Down Volume 2, but would also be the name of a later compilation record. Brian Wilson and Mike Love actually started writing the song the same day JFK was killed, accounting for the sad and melancholic feel to the song. As ever, we get hints of Wilson's experimentation - several massive key changes (C to Am to Eflat) - and the usual lush harmonies of the band at their peak.

The Warmth of the Sun (audio only)