Woo hoo for surprise hits
QUESTION Are there many bands and musicians whose biggest hit sounds nothing like their usual material?
BLUR’S Song 2, released in 1997, is one example of this. Although the band had scored a number of prior hits, the track was their first to become a significant success in America, and as such was their biggest song to date.
However, the song was not a pop gem in the classic Blur style. It was more like a US garage band – a noisy, two-minute blast with that famous ‘woo-hoo’ chorus.
The song’s success was so surprising that even the band themselves did not see it coming.
Indeed, guitarist Graham Coxon said the track was originally intended as a joke at the expense of the band’s record company.
Frontman Damon Albarn had composed the song, but it was originally a slower acoustic piece.
Coxon later recalled that he told his bandmate: ‘Let’s do it really, really fast, really, really noisy and horrible, and tell the record label we want to record it as a single, scare them to death – they’ll hate it.’ However, he added: ‘They [the label bosses] came in and we played it to them, giggling... they were like, “Wow this is excellent”. Our joke was foiled.’
The record company chiefs were prescient, it seems, as the song became a worldwide smash that is still aired regularly today, and even featured on an episode of The Simpsons. Ray Fagan, Dublin.
BABYBIRD’S 1996 hit You’re Gorgeous is a good example of this.
The UK band’s principal member, Stephen Jones, generally favoured dark lyrical themes in his songwriting and, prior to his smash hit, had released a string of albums that were decidedly raw and lo-fi in nature.
You’re Gorgeous, by contrast, was a pure pop song with a catchy chorus. It was a soaraway success but divided opinion – many found it cheesy and grating, and were left with the mistaken impression that Babybird were purveyors of bland and saccharine music.
Jones himself admitted he didn’t rate the song, and that he wasn’t even bothered including the original version on his earlier lo-fi albums, remarking: ‘I didn’t like it, so it didn’t get on.’
However, pressure from the band’s label convinced him to re-record the track, and the rest is history. Jones later recalled: ‘The record company saw the chorus was big. Some members of the band have said, “You should never have really done that”, but I think we all decided we should go along with it. And we did, because it was fun.’
Maurice Kennedy, Co. Kerry
QUESTION How was the giant blood-red waterfall in Antarctica formed?
BLOOD Falls is a waterfall that runs out of Antarctica’s Taylor Glacier. The red colour of the water has been found to be the result of iron-rich brine leaking from underneath the glacier which turns red when making contact with the air. The glacier was discovered in 1911 by the Australian geologist Thomas Griffith Taylor, who first explored the valley that bears his name.
The red water was first assumed to be the result of red algae. In fact, microbes have been shown to play a role but not in such a direct manner. The other mystery was why water was fluid at such low temperatures.
The explanation for the phenomenon was fully revealed in 2017. A radio-echo study concluded that when the Taylor Glacier formed about two million years ago, it trapped a briny lake and a network of subglacial rivers under it.
Within this lake is a unique subglacial ecosystem of microbes that metabolises sulphate and iron. The water remains liquid because the lake has such a high concentration of salt, which gives it a lower freezing point than pure water.
Furthermore, while it may sound counterintuitive, water releases heat as it freezes, and that energy melts the surrounding colder ice, and causes the water to flow.
A small amount escapes out of the south end of the glacier and, when exposed to the air, the iron oxidises and turns the water red. David Finch, Plymouth, Devon.
QUESTION Who holds the record for longest distance travelled on a paddle board?
THE Guinness World Record for piloting a stand-up paddle board or SUP belongs to Peter Charlesworth of Australia. From March 4 to June 11, 2023, he paddled 1,663.62 miles along the Murray River in Australia. He travelled solo and camped each night of the journey to achieve the feat. Charlesworth’s challenge was to raise awareness for heart health, after his own triple bypass in 2020.
Charlesworth surpassed the record set by Shilpika Gautam, who travelled 1,641.2 miles on a SUP, the length of the Ganges River in India, starting on October 2, 2016, and finishing 102 days later on January 17. Gautam’s mission was to raise awareness of water pollution in the Ganges and was challenging given the currents and pollution in the river.
South African waterman Chris Bertish made an extraordinary 93day solo trip across the Atlantic on a modified SUP in 2017. Bertish’s original mission was to paddle from Morocco to Florida, but bad weather forced him south. So he made a new destination: Antigua, a distance of 4,600 miles.
It took an estimated two million strokes to complete his epic journey, paddling 15 hours a day, mostly at night to avoid the sun. Diane Smith, Nerja, Spain.
Is there a question to which you have always wanted to know the answer? Or do you know the answer to a question raised here? Send your questions and answers to: Charles Legge, Answers To Correspondents, Irish Daily Mail, DMG Media, Two Haddington Buildings, 20-38 Haddington Road, Dublin 4, D04 HE94. You can also fax them to 0044 1952 510906 or you can email them to charles. legge@dailymail.ie. A selection will be published but we are not able to enter into individual correspondence.