If you ever talk to me and I can’t hear you, these bands and these songs are prob­a­bly to blame for the con­di­tion of my ears.

  • ‘Deb’s night out’ — Shi­had. They might turn the noise up to 11 on oth­er num­bers, but this is qui­eter, more con­tem­pla­tive and all the more pow­er­ful and bit­ter for it.
  • ‘The Lover’ — Fur Patrol. Is there any line more gut­ting than “This is the lover you left me for and I hope you’re hap­py now”? I don’t think so. Find it on their first EP Star­lifter.
  • ‘The Drinker’ — The Phoenix Foun­da­tion. “At the bot­tom of the bot­tle you can wipe your con­science clean” — and lord knows the Welling­ton­ista try that, although for us it should be “At the bot­tom of the pineap­ple…”
  • ‘And the truth fad­ed into dust’ — The Dukes of Leisure. Get your son­ic noise on. Best heard at the plan­e­teri­um for max­i­mum impact.
  • ‘I’m on fire’ — Head like a Hole. Nor­mal­ly it’s the Phoenix Foun­da­tion who get all The Boss up on us, but this cov­er is just per­fect, from Booga’s sleaze, to the wig-out at the end, and the video that fea­tured them play­ing on the roof ala U2, with the old Chan­nel Z Carhoona dri­ving around below.