Tidy Tunes 2019 #7/28 I Couldn't Be You - U.K. Subs

I Couldn't Be You - U.K. Subs

From the album

Another Kind of Blues
GEM
Released 14th September 1979

There are so many Singles and Albums that fall under the banner of 'My Soundtrack4Life' and they each have a different tale to tell.

Almost a year before the debut album from the U.K. Subs was released in 1979 (another that will celebrate its 40th Anniversary this year) they issued their debut single/ep C.I.D. on City Records. 

I think I first heard them on the Farewell To The Roxy album that had been released in April 1978 and contained two songs with a total time of two minutes and twelve seconds (I Live In A Car and Telephone Numbers) and then came their debut session for John Peel.

Debut John Peel Session

Recorded 23rd May 1978

Broadcast 31st May 1978

1. I Couldn't Be You 
2. Tomorrow's Girls 
3. Disease
4. C.I.D.
5. Stranglehold 

**********

It must have been within a month or so after hearing the Peel Session that I went to see them for the first time in concert, the first of many shows over the years!

On 'I Couldn't Be You' Charlie Harper brings to bear some of those R&B chops from his days fronting his first band back in 1964! It always seemed odd hearing a harmonica on a Punk Rock song but the song is actually a cover version by a British Rock and Roll singer John B. Presley. I've tried hunting for a version by him but to no avail at present. The song in a way seems a little bit out of place on the album but I think it is still one of the standout songs by the band.

I pulled the album out a few days ago having not played it for sometime and a host of memories came flooding back of running around with the Forest Hill Punks, bouncing around London and just outside going to U.K. Subs shows and other bands with my mates. 

The lyrics always made me laugh (I can't ever recall wanting to wear a "cowboy hat"!) and yet they seem so relevant to things today when people are forced to work way beyond pensionable age with great uncertainty about actually getting a works pension let alone the measley sum paid out for the State Pension! The other thing of course is that Charlie rejected that 9 to 5 to do something he loved and even though he is now beyond pensionable age he is still doing what he loves whether it be solo or with the band that has given him a lifeline since the 70s.

"They said that you’re a big boy now, it’s time to set you free in the world
Don’t forget that steady job, and don’t forget that steady girl
They said you start at nine o’clock and then we let you out at five
And if you act very smart you get a pension when you’re 65

I said I couldn’t be you if you wanted me to
And you couldn’t be me if I begged you to be"