Marc Almond at the Mermaid Theatre

Marc Almond at Union Chapel, London, originally uploaded by CharlesFred.

The BBC are very kindly recording some songs from Marc Almond's new album Stardom Road (out next week) with their BBC Radio Orchestra for broadcasting on Friday Night is Music Night programme on BBC Radio 2.

I had missed out on Marc's concerts at Wilton's Music Hall recently, the first since hius near fatal accident of three years ago, so it was good to be sent tickets for this concert by the BBC. I will be meeting up with some old and new Marc fan friends when I am there, which should be fun.

I had a look at Marc's website and was intrigued to see that they had compiled a top 50 list of favourite Marc songs from fans ( I must have missed the e-mails asking me to participate). I often used to like compiling my top 10 Marc songs, but haven't done so in a while. I happened to find this list, date 14th August 1998 and, to be honest, if I compiled the list again today it would not be much different. I will put them in order and see where they come on the total fans' list:

1 You Have (6) - can be seen on 'you tube' here
2 Soul Inside (19)
3 Split Lip (-)
4 Child Star (50)
5 My Hand Over My Heart (8)
6 St Judy (13)
7 Tenderness Is A Weakness (7)
8 Ruby Red (18)
9 Numbers (-)
10 Tragedy (10)

Quite a similarity, I suppose, and the two songs which did NOT make the top 50, Split Lip and Numbers are quite 'particular'. Good to see You Have still there in the top 10. If I would cahnge anything, I might take 'My Hand Over My Heart' out and put in either 'Your Aura' or 'The Desperate Hours'. The top 3 of the fans' choice were: 1 Say Hallo Wave Goodbye, 2 Torch and 3 Black Heart. I wonder of any from the new album will ever make the top 50...

Whilst on the subject of albums, my favourites would be:

1 Vermin in Ermine (7)
2 Mother Fist (1)
3 Enchanted (5)

Tags: marc almond, bbc, mermaid theatre, ruby red, you have, tenderness is a weakness, soul inside, split lip, soft cell