SLS: The Size Of A Cow

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This week’s Song Lyric Sunday invitation is to play a song about grass, cows, beef, condiments, fries or fast food, as Jim tells us in his post Celebrating International Burger Day. 28 May was the day for this, also known (less ostentatiously) as National Hamburger Day in the US – perhaps recognising that not everywhere in the world celebrates this, like here in the UK, for example. We enjoy our beef and our burgers, but don’t have the same prediliction for naming days. I did hear that it may have a name change in the US, though, to National Hamberder Day in honour of the dumbest of the dumb. Just wait for his Executive Order!

I gave this a lot of thought – yes, really – and have chosen three songs to play today. I’m not sure that any of them are really in keeping with the spirit behind the day, as they are all very English, but hey, these are universal themes aren’t they: we have grass and cows just about everywhere.

I’m starting with a bit of typically idiosyncratic English pop rock:

That was The Wonder Stuff and their second biggest hit, The Size of A Cow. Lyrics courtesy of genius.com can be found here.

The band was formed in 1986 in Stourbridge, in the West Midlands of England. The original line-up was Miles Hunt (whose uncle Bill Hunt was keyboard player with ELO and Wizzard) on vocals and guitar; Malcolm Treece on guitar and vocals; bassist Rob “The Bass Thing” Jones (died July 1993); and Martin Gilks (died April 2006) on drums. They released four albums and nearly 20 singles and EPs, enjoying considerable chart and live success in the UK, until they broke up in 1994, but they reformed in 2000 and have continued to tour and record since then. As the video shows there was a strong sense of humour running through their songs, even though this one is actually a rather sad piece about how a guy can’t cope with all his problems which are looming large in from of him: they seem to him to be as big as a cow, metaphorically speaking.

Like most of their songs this was written by Miles Hunt, and it was released as a single in April 1991 ahead of its inclusion on their third album, Never Loved Elvis, which came out the following month. The single reached #5 in the UK, and the album made #3. They were one of those bands I always enjoyed hearing, but I only ever owned one of their albums: the compilation of their singles, If The Beatles Had Read Hunter, which was released in September 1994 after they first broke up, and reached #8 in the UK. It was a wonderful collection and accompanied me often on the long drive to work around London’s North Circular Road, and it contained their biggest hit – a #1 with a cover of Tommy Roe’s Dizzy, with a guest appearance by the comedian Vic Reeves. The video for that was also fun!

My second song for today is also very English: a traditional folk song, in fact. How about this for a change of pace:

That was Steeleye Span with Spotted Cow, the opening track on their fourth album, Below The Salt, which was released in September 1972 and reached #43 in the UK. This was just in time for me to buy it before I went to uni at the end of that month, and the band were very much a part of my time there: I had already seen them in concert in Folkestone, where I lived, and then managed twice more during my uni years (and several more times since then!). As this is a traditional song which has been handed down through the centuries I didn’t expect to find the lyrics for it, but genius.com didn’t let me down. It is a typical English folk song, in which a young couple find enjoyment as a result of a cow that has gone AWOL, though not very far away, and it becomes a source of ongoing pleasure for them. Probably not what the originators of that National Day in the US had in mind, but it’s no use their beefing about it – outdoor jollies are very much a tradition here!

I promised you a third song for today, and for this I’m using one of the other prompt words:

The Move, with I Can Hear The Grass Grow, for which you can see the lyrics at the ever-reliable genius.com.

The song was written by Roy Wood, and was released in March 1967 as the band’s second single, peaking at #5 in the UK and making the top thirty in several other countries, though not in the US. As with many of Roy’s early songs, the basis of I Can Hear the Grass Grow was a book of fairy tales he wrote while at art college. The title came from photographer Robert Davidson, who had received a letter (from someone who remains unknown) that read “I listen to pop music on the radio because where I live it’s so bloody quiet that I can hear the grass grow.” He told this to Roy, who was inspired enough to write this song. According to Roy it is about a mentally ill person, and he has strenuously denied accusations by the music press that it was about the influence of drugs. Decide for yourself!

That’s all for today. As ever, I hope you enjoyed the music and give my gratitude to Jim for running the show and coming up with a seemingly endless supply of themes. Those lists of US National Days are becoming quite fruitful, aren’t they!

Enjoy your day, and see you again for Tuesday Tunes, I trust 🎶

45 thoughts on “SLS: The Size Of A Cow”

  1. I had The Move song on a single at the time, but my liking for it faded quickly. I was fickle with ‘pop music’ in those days. I only know of The Wonder Stuff from ‘Dizzy’ with Vic Reeves. It was fun, but I would never have bought it. You managed to spark memories of the North Circular Road, which I was not aware you had used for commuting. For me, it was a traffic bottleneck during my time in the London Ambulance Service.

    Best wishes, Pete.

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    • I liked The Move but bought their singles on a compilation album, as I did with The Wonder Stuff.

      I spent well over 10 years commuting round the North Circ, joining it at the end of the M11 and going right round to the Neasden IKEA store. It was constant major roadworks!

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      • Do you remember the tower block next to it? Our offices were the top six floors of that, until they moved us out before demolishing it. We had a fantastic view, and watched the temple being built.

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      • It’s amazing how close our paths came to crossing in those days. They held a big welcome day celebration when the temple opened, and we were invited to go along. An incredibly beautiful building, made of stone mostly shipped over from India, I think. The first Diwali celebrations there were massive. I was driving back up Brentfield Road from Harlesden as they all came out after a service: traffic at a complete standstill as a sea of humanity swarmed across the road, police looking helpless and shrugging their shoulders!

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      • All shipped from India, and built by craftsmen who travelled from India to build it. As emergency workers, we were the only ones allowed to keep our shoes on when entering the building, receiving special permission to do so.

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  3. The Wonder Stuff were one of the better aspects of the ’90’s, hardly my favourite decade for various reasons. Such intelligent pop fun. I like watching the video of The Move, particularly the miming of the bass player who seems to be singing a completely different song to the rest of them! Good 60’s pop, what a great time for music, probably the best.

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    • They were fun, weren’t they. I think that Move video goes in and out of sync several times! I agree on the 60s as the best decade for music, but then most would say that of the one in which their musical tastes were formed, I think.

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  4. Below the Salt has very good memories. My first stereo record player and the delight of hearing Gaudete progress from one speaker, through the player to the other speaker, like I was watching the monks pass by.

    I Can Hear The Grass Grow and its ‘companion’ Flowers in the Rain, were my favourite Move songs….. Actually I thought they were about folk being very much in tune with Nature…There you go every song has different meanings for different folks

    Keep on playing and spreading the music.🎵❤️🎶

    Roger

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  5. A top three again Clive, I really liked the Span number with its lovely finding pleasure out in the fields message, a sort of ‘living the Country Life In Rutland’ song.

    I hadn’t heard the Move song since Walter Gabriels time, so that was a welcome bit of nostalgia. I never knew it was similar in meaning to ‘watching paint dry,’ I just naively assumed it was about that smoking stuff!

    I have nothing to offer, the one title I could think of immediately was the B side to Norman Greenbaum’s ‘Spirit In The Sky,’ an odd deservedly forgotten little number called ‘Milk Cow.’ Gawd knows how or why that song stuck in the memory bank?

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    • I’m glad you liked these, thank you.

      There are lots of traditional English folk songs on the theme of fun in the fields: they had to have something to occupy themselves before tv came along!

      That is one of my favourMove singles – they had a great run of chart hits.

      My sister had Spirit In The Sky – one of those where the B-side was played once and once only!

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      • Midsummer and there’s hot hard work to be done in the fields. And somene has to do it…

        Yes, you gave us ‘Fire Brigade’ recently too- I guess ‘Flowers In The Rain’ sorta fits the pastoral theme as well.

        Yeah, there’s ‘B’ sides and then there’s ‘Z’ sides.

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  6. Needless to say I didn’t know any of these songs but I enjoyed them all. Thanks for giving me the idea to use a link to the lyrics instead of searching for lyric videos which don’t always work. Yes, I could type in the lyrics, but my posts are generally long enough without added verbiage. Well, it’s lunchtime here in the good old US of A so I think we’ll fire up the grill and throw on a few burgers! 😂

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    • I fully expected all of these to be unknown across the pond: a very English selection, and I’m pleased you enjoyed them. I started sharing links to the lyrics as copying and pasting was throwing my paragraphs all over the place, but as you say it has the added benefit of not making posts overly long.

      Enjoy your burgers – I had pasta today 🤣

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  11. The Wonder Stuff looks like a circus act in that video, but this song does have a great beat.  Steeleye Span is very British, and I enjoy listening to their voices.  I read Roy Wood was inspired by a letter he read in a teen magazine about a bored teenager in Surrey who complained, “It’s so boring where I live that I can hear the grass grow”, and I liked this song the best Clive.

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    • The Wonder Stuff played their videos for laughs – this is typical. Steeleye are a longtime favourite of mine – I first saw them live in 1971!

      I quoted a slightly different version of that growing grass story in the post – I guess it depends on the source!

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    • Thanks, Keith, I’m pleased you liked these. Jimmy Buffet means nothing to British audiences, apart from those of us who knew of him taking Caroline Jones under his wing. That song has been played twice today…so far 🤣

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  13. All three are new to me. Very enjoyable, all of them but there’s something about “hearing the grass grow” that’s super intriguing as a concept to me. Thanks for the introductions. Have a great day.

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  14. Great British Trio here Clive – I’d forgotten all about The Wonder Stuff I really liked their Indie-rock sound. I remember being shocked when they disbanded as they were on top form – very sad some of the group died so young. Thanks for rekindling my memories Clive 💜

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    • It is a bit of a mixture, isn’t it! I’m pleased you liked them all. Spotted Cow is a typical English folk song: a gentle tune, telling a story, with a bit of wholesome smut in there too. 🤣

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  17. I liked all three of these a lot. The first was really funny to hear and see all the silly things, the second was a nice little story song, and the last was almost sounding like the Beatles, good rock song, and I liked seeing and hearing the drums. 🙂

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    • I’m pleased you enjoyed them all, as I went the English route for this one! That last one was at the time of the Beatles heyday so I’m sure it had influences from them – as did just about everyone else back then.

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