#atozchallenge: U is For...

I was surprised by just how many songs beginning with the letter U there are which I class are favourites. I was expecting it to be a bit of slim list for this letter.

Ugly Bug Ball – Disney

When I was very little I had two favourite tapes. One was the Tom Paxton tape that I’ve referred to numerous times this month, the other was a Disney tape which had been copied from a record (which I think belonged to my cousins). The Disney tape had songs from The Jungle Book, Bedknobs and Broomsticks and a whole host of others. Ugly Bug Ball was one of them and later I had it on a Disney Sing-along video as well. It wasn’t until some time later (roughly twenty years in fact) that I watched the actual film that the song had come from; Summer Magic starring Hayley Mills, with the song sung by Burl Ives. I literally squealed with delight when I realised what it was.

Up On The Roof – Robson & Jerome

My mum was a big fan of Robson and Jerome when I was about nine or ten and I wound up with a couple of their CDs. I remember picking one out in Asda one day (there were a couple to choose from and I went with the one with the most tracks on it, clearly wanting value for money). Up On The Roof was one of those. Even now when I listen to their songs it reminds me of being a pre-teen, allowed to stay home by myself and listening to my favourite songs whilst dancing around the house. Speaking of dancing, check out those moves!

Nowadays this song kind of makes me think of ER, because whenever anyone had anything big to discuss they used to climb up onto the roof of the hospital to work things out, unwind, or propose whilst arguing. For years I’ve wanted to make a fanvid with this song and clips of all those moments.

Up! – Shania Twain

As a teenager I really got into Shania Twain’s music, something I kind of forgot about until I started doing this A to Z Challenge and looking at all the music I liked and how my opinions have changed over the years. This song came on a double album with the same songs repeated but done in slightly different styles; the red version was sort of poppy, the blue version had a sort of ethnic mix to it and then there was supposed to be a green version you could get online which was country but I never figured out how to get my hands on it.

This is one of those songs I like to play full blast, particularly when I’m having a bad day or I’m in a bit of a bad mood. It’s a great mood lifter.

Under The Influence – Status Quo

There were so many songs from this album that I could’ve picked because it is easily my favourite album, way back under the letter B I had Blessed Are The Meek which I ended up cutting in favour of a couple of others. I decided to include this song as representative of the whole Under the Influence album because I also cut Twenty Wild Horses from yesterday's post.

When it came out I was about twelve and on crutches with a damaged Achilles tendon. The band did a pub tour for over-18s only which my brother and I were too young to go along to, but when they did a signing at an HMV in Bristol we all went along with my best friend. There my brother, who was only about five at the time, asked if Status Quo could come and play at his birthday party because he was too young to go to the show. Words were had with various people present and it was arranged that we could go to the soundcheck. For the next few years, every time we went to a concert we got to go backstage and almost ten years later they actually played a show on my brother’s birthday, and he got a signed card from them.