Better by You, Better than Me

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Debouching from a fumarole of our smouldering political volcano for even the shortest break is welcome, and thanks to Jane's throwaway Halloween mention of Spooky Tooth, a band lost so far back in the mists of UK rock history, they are known only to a very few survivors; I have just so done. The title of this piece is the title of the first track from the band's album Spooky Two, which I admit I have only owned in MP3 form and is buried in the bowels of my old iPod, whose current location is moot.

Rather, the track was a key feature of my musical adolescence, and is one I still love to this day: it was featured on the Island label compilation album 'Nice Enough to Eat' from 1969. I think I still have three copies of this budget release in various states of scratched-up [vinyl, natch] disrepair. Riff Rock at it's most basic and finest, 'Better...' is a stripped-down but subtly sophisticated little number that chugs and delights in equal measure, at least to the kind of ears I own.

Jane's mention of the band instantly brought to mind a nearly forgotten fragment of memory from around 1970, when I went to a garden party in the Cannon Hill district of Birmingham, out back of a large old Victorian house, which by then was almost certainly flats occupied by the kind of urban freak I was then aspiring to be. One of the bands that played live that night, whose name is lost in time, played 'Better...' and played it very well indeed. I have no memory of how the rest of the evening panned out, however, or why: one can only make assumptions as to our mental state at this remove, so I'll leave it at that.

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