Playlist 08.02.10

I got my first cassette recorder for Xmas 1972. I know this because my first few recordings are severely stamped into the recall system: 'You Wear It Well' by Rod Stewart, 'Crazy Horses' by The Osmonds and Marc Bolan bleating out 'Children Of The Revolution'. In those days, the immediacy of the scheme was so exciting that there was little thought for sonic fidelity.

Only now do I realize that when I recorded 'You're So Vain' by Carly Simon (microphone held to the radio speaker, natch) that the batteries were done and so the machine was grinding, pitching and playing havoc with the cheap cassette oxide. As a result, poor Carly sounded like she was performing said tune in a mid-Atlantic tornado, while sucking

helium and losing the will to live. Now, when I hear the 'proper' version, it sounds somehow wrong. It's in tune, for starters, and you can hear all those priceless words of venom and contempt. In the recent Warren Beatty biography, they said that he recognized himself in the song and contacted the author to say thanks. What a guy.

On her new album of acoustic versions, Carly revisits the song with a little less of the anger. Nevertheless, it's still a faultless portrait of a rotter supreme.

STUART BAILIE

BBC Radio Ulster, 92-95 FM

Online: www.bbc.co.uk/radioulster

Mondays, ten - midnight

Primal Scream - Come Together (Farley mix) (Creation)

Carl Perkins - Power Of My Soul (T Bird)

Lightspeed Champion - Marlene (Domino)

Mississippi John Hurt - Candy Man Blues (Rounder)

Lawrence Arabia - I've Smoked Too Much (Bella Union)

Johnny Cash - For The Good Times (Lost Highway)

Gil Scott Heron - On Coming From a Broken Home (XL)

Frightened Rabbit - Living In Colour (Fat Cat)

Carly Simon - You're So Vain (Rhino)

Josh Rouse - Lemon Tree (Bedroom Classics)

Husky Rescue - Sound Of Love (Catskills)

Second hour co-presented by Duke Special

Duke Special - Catfish (Reel To Reel)

Dan Michaelson and the Coastguards - 'Now I'm A Coastguard' (Memphis

Industries)

Duke Special - Wanda (Reel To Reel)

Magnetic Fields - California Girls (Nonesuch)

Them - I Gave My Love A Diamond (Decca)

Duke Special - Farmhouse Song (Reel To Reel)

Bertholt Brecht, Theo MacKeben - Mack the Knife (Naxos)

American Music Club - 'Home' (Cooking Vinyl )

Duke Special - Scandal (Reel To Reel)

Kate and Anna McGarrigle - "Heart Like A Wheel" (Ryko)