My Guilty Music Secret

We were sitting in my living room recently and my mate suddenly pulled out a CD from my CD shelves.
'What you got to say to this, Crushed?'

The CD in question was 'We are the Pipettes'

'Yeah, it's mine' I admitted. Couldn't really deny it. It was stuck under 'P' in the Year 2000+ (Non Dance) section. It wasn't accidentally sitting there, it was definitely filed where it belonged.
'And you have a go at me for having INXS' he said.

I say to you now, what I said to him 'Yeah, OK, it's not exactly high quality music. It's not stuff you play to stimulate your mind, not stuff you play to conceptualise, not stuff you play to unwind. And no, it ain't going to impress anyone, you having it on your shelves. But I do find them uplifting sometimes.'



Why? Because they're real women. I mean, I listen to Dido, or Garbage, or Shakespeare's Sister to hear the finer details of female emotions expressed in song. Listening to the combination of lyrics and vocal expression in female vocalists of their calibre, provides an insight in to the inner workings of the female mind.

And I listen to Rihanna for pure erotic quality.
Yeah, a steamy weekend with Rihanna would be lovely.
But any more than that would, let's face it, be a bit much.

Not sure I could actually live up to that particular challenge.



But the Pipettes are real women. Real women, who bear a fairly definite resemblance to the actual women you'd actually want to settle down with, as opposed to fantasy women.
They are the sort of women, you'd actually chat up down the pub. They belong to the exact social background and age group that IN REALITY, you're comfortable with. The oldest is twenty-seven, the youngest (Rosay), is maybe a little too young, at twenty-two. But they'd all fit in down The Star, where maybe Siobhain Fahey might not. Or certainly, Siobhain Fahey in reality might well have most men for breakfast.

Yes, in a sense they're manufactured tack. But most manufactured tack consists of unreal plastic pin ups, who just do nothing for me. Not so The Pipettes.

They look like girls you'd want to settle down with. Girls who'd fit in nicely in the life you actually lead, not a dream life.

And they sing like girls you know would. It's not melodious, it's real. And it's about real stuff. You listen to their songs and you think, yeah, that's the voice of the ordinary woman of my generation. They are the admin girls, the barmaids, the girl at the supermarket, the girl in the newsagents, the one you flirt with and she blushes.

And when I listen to the lyrics, I feel re-assured. Because I know that most people really don't want to sit around analysing their emotions, unless they're songwriters. The Pipettes sing about life and love, the way our generation actually live it, and it's nice to hear real women singing it the way it is.



And it helps I think to be reminded of reality, to put your feet back on the ground and realise that neither Rihanna, nor Siobhain Fahey would really make you happy.

A Pipette would.