Songs For The Days Of The Week

Many of us work 5 days a week, have fun over the weekend. And yet Sunday offers less opportunity for going full throttle because you have to be fresh for work Monday. Mondays are always tougher to stomach than other weekdays because of the changeover from your leisure time to work time. Fridays are full of expectancy for the weekend ahead. Wednesdays are blurgh nothingy days in the middle of the week.... So since many people's weeks are so rhythmic, I thought I'd look at the music associated with them.

I've already done 7 songs for Monday and the return to work feeling here. (It's proved to be my most popular musical blog post yet, other than my scorecard for Joy Division cover versions post) So below are 2 songs a day for each of the other 6 days of the week.

SUNDAY:
Velvet Underground - "Sunday Morning"
New York, Andy Warhol, Avant Garde, Cale's viola, Tucker's drumming, Nico's inhuman, sexless delivery, 'the most influential record of the late 20th Century' etc etc. And while the Velvet's self-title debut is a truly great record, this track sees Lou Reed in wistful mode as with the later "Perfect Day", rather than the deeply unsettling "Venus In Furs" or "All Tomorrow's Parties".



U2 - "Sunday Bloody Sunday
U2 getting all political? Were they calling for a Royal Commission of Inquiry into events in Derry in 1972 Don't worry, carry on drinking your mango and peach smoothie and rest easy. Bono's wooly, vague lyrics call for nothing more than all coming together and joining hands to seal the victory claimed by Jesus. You can almost here the sound of his hackles rising here as his back raises up against the wall...



TUESDAY:
Cowboy Junkies - "Sun Comes Up It's Tuesday Morning"
Cowboy Junkies offered the chance for Country Music to become more palatable to a rock audience, with their Canadian sensibilities and a beautiful voice in the form of Margo Timmins. Even I liked them. But the meme didn't quite stick and we ended up with Garth Brooks and Billy Ray Cyrus instead.



Rolling Stones - "Ruby Tuesday"
Either you respect their Bloated Satanic Majesties as they pound on into their 50th year, or you yearn for their Blues tinged early days from which this song emerged. This version makes htem sound like Flowered Up!



WEDNESDAY:
The Undertones - "Wednesday Week"
This is more like it, love marked out by the number of days without the phone call being returned. (Of course long since disappeared now with instant texting and the like). The true rhythms marked out by tiny signs and tokens, received or missed. Whole days at work lost to mooning over some object of improbable desire. Or phoning your mate to forensically dissect the previous evening's eye signals in the pub... This si what Pop Music was invented for!



Simon And Garfunkel - "Wednesday Morning 3 AM"
The sound of their voices is so tentative that it really does sound like 3am and not wanting to wake the face on the pillow next to you, even as you go through the mill wondering just what the hell it is you've done rolling over a liquor store to get money. Cops will be there with their battering ram in a couple of hours...



THURSDAY:
David Bowie - "Thiursday's Child"
I've said it before, for all his longevity, you can count the number of decent tunes Bowie's produced on the fingers of one finger, sorry hand. This isn 't one of them, but Thursday turned out to be the hardest day of the week to find tunes for.



Rollins Band - "Thursday Afternnon"
Our 'enry does even less singing on this track than on most. But he's not shouting either, so this must be one of his more mellow ditties. A peaen to love or something? Search me... Love the cocktail bar chitter-chatter in the mix! You just know two seconds after the tape cuts out, Henry is berating them for not keeping the noise down!



FRIDAY:
Nancy Sinatra - Friday's Child
You gotta love Nancy. The scion of the King of Crooners himself, it was always going to be hard to forge her own path through the 'Middle of the Road' music world, but by taking a slightly sinister and off-kilter slant she managed it alright. This is a perfect example of it I feel.



The Cure - "Friday I'm In Love"
Robert Smith, the boy who never grew up. In fact he actually regressed, from the student who wrote a song based on the novel he studied for French O-Level, to someone who seemed to want to exist in the world of Charlotte Sometimes. Is that a long-sleeved shirt or a straitjacket?



SATURDAY:
The Jam - "Saturday's Kids"
Ah the weekend, freedom, time away from the weekly grind right? Not with these two songs about desultory Saturday youth. The V-Neck shirts and baggy trousers might have changed, but not the sentiment.



The Specials - Friday Night, Saturday Morning
The B-Side to the epoch defining "Ghost Town", Terry Hall's vocal sounds even more desolate than on the flipside track. Brilliant. Wonderful Jerry Dammers keyboard solo in the middle too!