Welcome to “On The Flippity-Flop,” where your Idolators spotlight unjustly ignored B-sides, bonus tracks, compilation contributions, and EP cuts. Send your suggestions to tips@idolator.com.
ARTIST: Sleeper
SONG: “Ha Ha You’re Dead”
FIRST APPEARANCE: Alice EP, 1993
WHY IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN AN A-SIDE: As far as debut releases go, there weren’t many in the 1990s stronger than Sleeper’s. “Alice in Vain” itself was a perfectly fine A-Side, but it was just one of three on this 7″ single that could’ve done the job. None finer than “Ha Ha You’re Dead,” however. The four-sided bassline keeps Louise Wener’s cynical schadenfreude in a tightly defined and claustrophobic box, until the 2:35 mark when Jonathan Stewart’s tipsy guitar run lifts the lid on the song and reshapes it completely if only for a few seconds. I don’t think Sleeper ever again equalled “Ha Ha,” even if they did go on to have at least another handful of memorable singles.
Cool, thanks. I read “Goodnight Steve McQueen.” Although I don’t particularly remember why.
OMG, I’ve magically teleported back to high school with this one — and the hours I used to spend in the local used CD shop digging for anything new and good that no one had heard of yet. Oh, nostalgia!
Anyone else read Louise’s novel (unsure if she’s written more than one). It was pretty enjoyable, although too self-conciously Hornby-esque.
She has at least two, in that we got in a recent novel of hers the other day at my library.
There’s three: Goodnight Steve McQueen, The Big Blind (a/k/a The Perfect Play) and The Half Life of Stars. Read the first two; they’re pat but well-written, I suppose.