80s Cup Final 15 - Kaspar 12-11 Polishgirl

[Penk!]

A

Tom Waits - Rain Dogs



B

Pet Shop Boys - It's a Sin

[The Write Profile]

I love both tracks for very different reasons- the Tom Waits for its compellingly ramshackle gallows humour, and B for its out and proud ebullience. But it's got to be the Pet Shop Boys this time around, solely because it has more layers. Great matchup, mind. B

[Rayge]

B, for pretty much the same reasons as The Write Profile

[C]

A nod to the Captain

-+A+-

oooof!




.

[The Modernist]

I feel a bit burnt out on "It's a Sin" these days. It feels like a track without much depth, a slightly thin song dressed up in a dramatic production. I wanted to like 'Rain Dogs' more than I did ( something I could apply to Waits generally), it's different and colourful, but feels a bit contrived in its eccentricity. Ultimately it's not something I can really enjoy.

B

[Samoan]

A

[Dayodead]

Need to be in the mood for Waits and at the moment, I'm not...Marginal Vote for B

[Purgatory Brite]

A

Waits owned the 80s!

[toomanyhatz]

I feel like I've heard some PSB I've liked OK, but this clearly ain't it. It's a pretty tight race between "the sounds of the day," the singing, the length, or the musical and lyrical cliches that turns me off to it. But it could be any or all of the above.

I tired of Waits eventually, but I do remember how refreshing A was when it first came out. If only he hadn't spent the next 30 years repeating it. Time to come out of the shed, Tom!

[Polishgirl]

I just don't like Tom Waits: I have tried. ( I haven't. )

B is high pop, and appeals to my Catholic sensibilities.

B

[trans-chigley express]

It's a Sin is not a favourite PSB tune but I really didn't like A at all.

B

[Deebank]

God, the Pet Shop Boys
If there's one band I have never understood the appeal of it's them. Luke-warm unimaginative hi-energy with flat disinterested singer plus a few warmed-over Devo presentation quirks. Poor.

I was never that arsed with Waits either but at least he's interesting

A

[never/ever]

It is kind of funny how the music intelligentsia ran away with Waits... as if the world needed a Beefheart -incarnation to offset the endless stream of flashy pop hitting the charts. This track really feels like a throwaway, a coda rather than a song and I suspect the entrant was afraid that any longer track may have immediately steered votes away from it....

Fortunately, it is up against a stream of warm piss down a trouserleg.....


A

[WG Kaspar]

A

[Darkness_Fish]

The problem with Waits is just that the music isn't as clever, difficult or interesting as he thinks it is. It's aiming for a Beefheartian dissonance, but sounds like The Muppets playing The Mavericks "Dance the Night Away". Which would be better than this.

"It's a Sin" was the first 12" single I ever bought. I know this because I still remember being confused that it didn't play at 33 1/3 rpm. It perhaps confirmed that they really deserved to be one hit wonders, because it doesn't have anywhere near the pop smarts of "West End Girls", though I didn't think so at the time. It kind of sounds like the intermission music for a 24 hour news channel. Perhaps Vatican State TV runs this regularly? I think Neil Tennants' vocal give the song a wistful credibility the tune doesn't really deserve. But overall, it's certainly better than A.

B

[fange]

I've come to like A very much, a highlight from an album that I took a long time to warm to, as I came to Waits through The Heart of Saturday Night and found his 80s direction a bit perplexing. B is good too, but not GREAT PSB, so i'll go for A.


A

[Loki]

Always willing to give Waits a chance, but I'm still not convinced. "Sin" isn't a fave, but it's good enuf here.

[Jumper K]

And so it comes down to this. The last match. Kind of sums up the 80s as a whole. A shitstorm of desperate arty chancers and vapid electronics. And Tom Waits.
Bollocks to the whole sorry decade of cultural irrelevance.

[Neige]

With hindsight B is responsible for stuff like Army of Lovers with its horrible grandiloquence.

But I love Waits' Island albums a lot.

A

[Ranking Ted]

Again, really like both. I’m a late-ish (over 10 years ago now, mind) convert to pots & pans Waits and this is a goodie. B is not my favourite PSB but the oomphed up re-write of Wild World just about grabs it.

B