Check your watches, it’s Squeeze o’clock. That means it’s the goodtime singalong hour, with South London’s finest kitchen-sink troubadours offering a master class is catchy pop brilliance. Glenn Tilbrook is nominally in charge, but he’s accompanied with gusto by several thousand members of the Deptford Fun City Under Canvas Choir (Suffolk branch), who appear to be as familiar with the lyrics of “Up The Junction”, “Annie Get Your Gun” and “Take Me I’m Yours” as the songs’ author, Chris Difford. It’s an endlessly pleasing jukebox of a set, but special mention should go to the vintage soulful slow-burner “Tempted”, which sounds crunchier and more finger-clickingly vital than at any time in its past, a testament to the fact that Squeeze’s reunion of two years and counting is not just a lazy take-the-money-and-run exercise. Amid all the pristine singles, they throw us a couple of curveballs, with a punky charge through “It’s So Dirty”, their early years ironic anthem to laddish misogyny (“It’s so dirty when it’s in the right mood/Give it some brandy and some Chinese food”), and the knees-up rockabilly of “Melody Motel”, which Glenn describes as “a jovial little ditty about betrayal and murder”. Perfect festival fare, of course. TERRY STAUNTON
Check your watches, it’s Squeeze o’clock. That means it’s the goodtime singalong hour, with South London’s finest kitchen-sink troubadours offering a master class is catchy pop brilliance.
Glenn Tilbrook is nominally in charge, but he’s accompanied with gusto by several thousand members of the Deptford Fun City Under Canvas Choir (Suffolk branch), who appear to be as familiar with the lyrics of “Up The Junction”, “Annie Get Your Gun” and “Take Me I’m Yours” as the songs’ author, Chris Difford.
It’s an endlessly pleasing jukebox of a set, but special mention should go to the vintage soulful slow-burner “Tempted”, which sounds crunchier and more finger-clickingly vital than at any time in its past, a testament to the fact that Squeeze’s reunion of two years and counting is not just a lazy take-the-money-and-run exercise.
Amid all the pristine singles, they throw us a couple of curveballs, with a punky charge through “It’s So Dirty”, their early years ironic anthem to laddish misogyny (“It’s so dirty when it’s in the right mood/Give it some brandy and some Chinese food”), and the knees-up rockabilly of “Melody Motel”, which Glenn describes as “a jovial little ditty about betrayal and murder”. Perfect festival fare, of course.
TERRY STAUNTON
