Songs to Learn and Sing: EP 1000 - the final episode
A few words on Episode 1000 of Songs to Learn and Sing taking in: Cork Campus Radio, West Dublin Access Radio, Dublin City FM, 30 years of community radio, Echo & the Bunnymen, and more.
MiniDiscs of old episodes of Songs To Learn and Sing. Photograph by Paul McDermott
Last night I broadcast my final weekly radio programme for 103.2 Dublin City FM.
Episode 1 of Songs to Learn and Sing was broadcast on 14 September 2004. I’ve missed some weeks, I’ve had to repeat a few shows but last night was Episode 1000. That seemed like a good round number to bow out on.
I’ve written previously about my passion for community broadcasting (Songs to Learn and Sing: 20th Anniversary) so I’m not going to write loads here but I’ve been involved with community radio for 30 years: first on Cork Campus Radio (now UCC 98.3FM) and then West Dublin Access Radio before finally finding a home with Dublin City FM in 2003.
Songs to Learn and Sing was named after Echo & the Bunnymen’s 1985 singles compilation. It was the first Bunnymen album I bought and I still regard it as one of the greatest compilations ever released.
I thought the title of that compilation would make the perfect name for a radio programme that broadcast a mix of new and old tunes. Songs that you might be hearing for the first time and familiar songs you could sing along to.
I’ve enjoyed every minute of it, it’s always been a privilege to have access to the airwaves and I never took it for granted. I want to thank anyone who listened to the programme and a special word of thanks goes to all the people who contacted the programme over the years - go raibh maith agaibh go léir!
Episode 1000 was a hard programme to put together. I first compiled a list of some of my favourite songs from the last 20 years, but that was an impossible task - how could I narrow that down to around 13 songs?
In the end I went for the easier task of picking some of my favourite songs from some of my favourite artists. All of these songs will be familiar to most except possibly the Five Go Down to the Sea? tune. Episode 1000 can be heard below and Song Notes for these 10 tunes are further down the page.
Slán agus beannacht!
Songs to Learn and Sing EP 1000
11pm Monday, 24 February 2025
The Final Episode
The Smiths – I Started Something I Couldn’t Finish
Julian Cope – Up-Wards At 45º
Rollerskate Skinny – Speed to My Side
My Bloody Valentine – Soon
John Cale – (I Keep A) Close Watch
The Fall – Blindness
The Fatima Mansions – Blues for Ceausescu
Stereolab – French Disko
Five Go Down to the Sea? – Blue Moon
Microdisney – And
Songs to Learn and Sing EP 1000 – Song Notes:
The Smiths – I Started Something I Couldn’t Finish
The band had just broken up but Rough Trade would release two more singles. ‘I Started Something I Couldn’t Finish’ was no. 16 of 17 singles The Smiths released in Ireland and the UK. Still sublime.
Julian Cope – Up-Wards At 45º
The centre-piece of Jehovahkill, my favourite Cope album. Spoon recorded a brilliant version for Triple J’s Like A Version in Australia. Listen to it here.
Rollerskate Skinny – Speed to My Side
One of the greatest Irish singles ever released. I remember DJing in Sir Henry’s on Fridays with John O’Leary and playing ‘Speed to My Side’. We’d played it for weeks to half-empty floors, determined to make it work. Then finally one night it clicked. As hundreds packed the dancefloor singing in unison: “Nobody ever told me that this sort of thing could come alive,” it seemed to me as if the collective energy in the room would lift the roof right off the famed venue. John and I turned and high-fived, you’d swear we had written the bloody song we were that proud.
My Bloody Valentine – Soon
“They invented it. All you have to do is listen to it,” declared the full page adverts in the music press that announced the release of Loveless. 34 years on, I’m still listening to it. I never tire of Loveless or ‘Soon’ its glorious final track.
John Cale – (I Keep A) Close Watch
“This is a love song, so hold onto someone you love,” says Cale introducing this live version of ‘(I Keep A) Close Watch’ taken from his superlative live album, Fragments of a Rainy Season. The original studio version appeared on Helen of Troy, the third album Cale released for Island Records in the 70s.
The Fall – Blindness
No one could have predicted the return to form of The Fall in the early 00s: The Real New Fall LP gave us ‘Theme From Sparta FC’; Reformation Post TLC gave us ‘Reformation’ and ‘Fall Sound’; and Fall Heads Roll gifted us ‘Blindness’ - one of their greatest songs. “Blind man, have mercy on me.”
The Fatima Mansions – Blues for Ceausescu
“There is no constitution, Goodbye.” A juggernaut of a tune that’s as relevant today as it was back in 1990.
Stereolab – French Disko
“Well I say there are still things worth fighting for
La resistance!”
Five Go Down to the Sea? – Blue Moon
“I was nearly knocked down by a bus today, then the stupid driver drove the bus away.”
Over 25 years ago Giordaí Ua Laoighaire from the Nine Wassies From Bainne called around to my flat with a tape of a Fanning session recorded by Five Go Down to the Sea? He played ‘Blue Moon’ for myself and two friends and we were all completely stunned. ‘Blue Moon’ continues to stun me. It’s a sad, mournful tune unlike any other recorded by Finbarr Donnelly, Ricky Dineen and co. Donnelly’s gurning vocals wrapped around Dineen’s scratchy guitar line; I think it’s staggeringly good. When we were compiling Hiding From the Landlord - the Nun Attax, Five Go Down to the Sea? and Beethoven compilation - I insisted that ‘Blue Moon’ had to feature. I’m so glad we rescued this song from the RTÉ vaults.
Microdisney – And
”And you must last ‘til the end
Learn to love this life
You are just there to clear the air
‘til the clock comes down the stairs”
How do you bring 1000 episodes to a close? You go out on the closing song from The Clock Comes Down the Stairs, one of the greatest albums ever made. RIP Cathal.
