Pop Culture from an Alternate Dimension

       250 years ago, the United States was fighting a bloody war with Great Britain to gain independence, yet the two nations are still inextricably linked, especially in pop culture. Influences from movies, music, etcetera go both ways. So it makes sense that the Commonwealth would have songs showing mixed feelings of the U.S. (for the sake of simplicity I will define the Commonwealth as any country that had Queen Elizabeth on their money).         I open the album with "Kids in America" who is English and was an adult when she recorded this song. David Bowie follows with another song of American youth. The Scottish band Simple Minds follow, Brits Supertramp have a spot of "Breakfast in America" and The Clash say how they feel about the U.S.A. Aussies AC/DC give their appreciation of American thighs in "You Shook Me All Night Long". E.L.O. are "Calling America" while The Proclaimers of Scotland look forward to a "Letter from America"....

       I've used Spinal Tap before on this blog (Loving Large, The Fantastic 80s, The Singing Sixties and The Namesake Series of audiobooks) and to honour their new movie, I present SHARK SANDWICH, the album with the two word review. The front cover is the from the movie, the band photo was taken by Bob Gruen at CBGB's and the back illustration and design is by me.      To make a playlist I used "Sex Farm" from the This is Spinal Tap soundtrack and "Rock 'n' Roll Nightmare" which can be found on their Back From the Dead album. I also used two songs from other heavy metal parodies: "Drink Till I Die" by Bad News from the series The Comic Strip Presents and "Black Moon" by Strange Fruit as seen in the movie Still Crazy. Two more songs from actual 1980 albums: "Close Encounters" by Hilly Michaels and "Ear in the Snow" from Atomic Rooster (which once had Ric Parnell, of Spinal Tap, as a member. Two more songs sup...