Gavin' Index

No.4: LINE DANCING

American Country Line Dancing comprises pre-set routines of moves performed in lines. Everyone starts at the same time, dances the same steps in synchronization with everyone else. The moves are the same for both men and women and you will find that the steps often reappear.

It is the sign of a good dancer to step backwards onto the heels, releasing the toes and "fanning" the toes out to the side, but this may take a little practice.

"Everybody is talking about how Europeanised Dublin is, but I turned around in Mr. Pussy's one night and saw that I was surrounded by Mr. Pussy on stage, other transvestites, kids from raves, and heard Gainsbourg on the CD, and thought 'this is Dublin, this is Night-town'. But it's also is what it must have felt like to be alive in the 30s, to be Marlene Dietrich! I've always had that fascination for culture between the wars and really do believe that Dublin, and indeed Ireland, has that same energy now, particularly in the wake of the ceasefire. That's the Irish context for this album."

"'Shag Tobacco' is probably the most heterosexual song I've ever written, and the most honest statement in the aftermath of getting married," Gavin says. "It's a love song about coming home late, walking into that kitchen, sitting there having a cup of tea, knowing that upstairs is the one I love. And it definitely is me trying to make ordinary things extraordinary, in the lyric. But though the lyrics are fairly straightforward, saying I'm going to walk up those stairs into our bedroom, the music takes you on a different journey. That journey is 'Apocalypse Now': male sexuality is very predatory, so while I'm serenading my loved one, the music is having intercourse. And you feel that in the rhythms. There are a couple of climaxes there!"[contd]

Joe Jackson

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