Hey!

I haven't had many musical epiphanies in my life (who has?), but one I clearly remember happened about 8 years ago. I was channel hopping in bed, trying to wake up, when I turned onto VH1 classics. They were showing Bo Diddley's Bo Diddley, a grainy performance from sixties TV. Something about it made me sit bolt upright in my bed, utterly captivated by the video. The primal backbeat, the egotastic simplicity of the lyric, Bo's shuffling dance, the bee-hived female backing vocals (which I'm always a sucker for), the screaming, white teenagers and sheer force of the song all compressed into a two minute alarm clock. I can't help but be jealous of everyone involved, existing at a time when music felt truly revolutionary, not just sonically, but socially.

Thanks to the joys of the modern world, I can now share this video with you. I hope you feel ten percent of the joy that I feel when I watch it:

June 5th is environment day