I'm In A Different World (Connecticut)

Dave Stewart and Barbara Gaskin released an excellent single in 1984: a heavily reworked Four Tops cover, I'm In A Different World (b/w Henry and James). Neither side of the single was a hit, but other musicians paid attention, and everyone from the Pet Shop Boys at the time to Mark Ronson recently has strip-mined these tracks. Stewart & Gaskin's IIADW strikes me as perfect Manic Pixie Dream Girl Movie s/track material. My visuals go back to the original, slightly frightening, manic pixie, Kate Hepburn's Susan Vance in Hawks's Bringing Up Baby (1938), but I'm vaguely hopeful that my vid. might help get the song discovered by someone making a contemporary film. We'll see.

BTW, the cutie at the beginning of the clip (with the good comic timing and Grace Kelly voice) playing Cary Grant's fiancee is Virginia Walker. Under personal contract to Hawks, BUB was Walker's debut and big break. But in a screwball-worthy twist, soon after BUB wrapped, Walker eloped to Mexico with Hawks's brother, thereby leaving the business. Walker did return in a few (mostly uncredited) very minor parts in 1945-1946, but died soon after that, at age 30, following (according to Louella Parsons) 'a long illness'. Too bad/sad.

Clicks in Ball of Fire (1941)

It's a cute conceit: Katherine "Sugarpuss" O'Shea (Stanwyck) clicks her way through Hawks's Ball of Fire (1941), loses her click-mojo slightly near the end, but evidently has passed much of it on to her Professor-cherubs (who need it). BoF is a slight film in many ways, but it grows on you, and Stanwyck's on fire throughout. Of course, in 1941 Stanwyck was brilliant all over, doing The Lady Eve for Sturges and Meet John Doe for Capra. Two bona fide classics and a delightful romp: pretty good year.

The Expressos' Want

The Expresso's Want (a.k.a. What She Wants), not previously available on youtube, is my favorite album track from the splendid Pillows and Ties (1981). It broadly apes the great Doc Pomus song (Marie's the Name Of) His Latest Flame which was a hit for Elvis in 1961. The Smiths' Rusholme Ruffians strip-mined the same tune 3 years later to excellent effect on Meat is Murder, but the Expressos got there first!

My visuals are from the Drum Boogie sequence in Hawks's Ball of Fire (1941). Although I regard BOF as second-tier Hawks and second-tier screwball more generally, Barbara Stanwyck is incandescent in it, and the Drum Boogie number lights that fuse. The unadulterated Drum Boogie number is widely available on youtube, e.g., here, so I hope that purists won't object to me adapting it to give the unjustly overlooked Expressos a boost. And if you like new wave girl pop, you owe it to yourself to see some screwballs of the '30s and '40s. There's a still under-explored connection between the feisty movie gal generation of Stanwyck, Colbert, Lombard, Arthur, etc. and the music generation of Pattie Smith, Siouxsie, Pauline Murray, Chrissie Hynde, and Debbie Harry (to which The Expressos' Roz Rayner certainly belongs).

Want's lyrics near as I can make out (corrections/improvements welcome) are as follows:

Want
Want
Want
[That's what] Is there someone to meet here
[What you want] Every thing I see here
[Want] Somebody tell me
What you gonna do for a guy that's true?
[Want] A pretty conversation
[What you want] Electric lubrication
[Want] A whole lotta love from you

Is there someone here I can call on tonight?
Take me by the hand, I'll lead you to unite
Our feelings grow so tired I want to get out
And when I get the chance I can show you what I want

[You know you want] A little bit of loving
[What you want] A little bit of something
[Want] A whole lotta love from you

Got my tickets in the hand and I'm walking out the door
If you stop me now, I'll never walk away no more
If these sophisticated people for a while
And when I get the chance I can show you what I want

[You knows you want] Uh oh, come on
[What you want] Gimme gimme gimme gimme
[Want] Gimme gimme gimme gimme Owwww

(Solo)

If these sophisticated people for a while
And when I get the chance I can show you what I want

[You knows you want] Oh
[What you want] Oh, come on
[want] Gimme gimme gimme gimme
[Want] Give it to me
[Want] Gimme gimme gimme gimme
[Want] Gimme gimme gimme gimme
[Want] Ohhh
[What you want] Gimme gimme gimme gimme
[What you want]