SQUEEZESTRANGER THAN
THE STRANGER ON
THE SHORE
(FROM SWEETS FROM
A STRANGER, 1982)
Chosen because
we wanted to
discuss why
some songs
just don’t work,
this attack on the
music industry was on
Squeeze’s fi nal album before
they split for three years.
Chris: “Oh God! This was
written at the time when I no
longer knew what a song
was. I was drifting, and you
can tell that from the lyrics.
Musically, the song is nothing
either. I’ve got nothing to say
about that song.”
Glenn: “Er... Ha! What to
say? Sometimes, things I wrote
weren’t suitable for the band.
I didn’t altogether realise how
to play to Squeeze’s strengths
then. Plenty of my demos attest
to my love of dance music, but
there’s a big part of Squeeze
- mainly Chris – that’s against
dance music. You can’t force
a band to be something they
don’t want to be. Points Of
View, on the same album,
is a much more successful
alternative version of dance
music. Being in a band was
all I’d ever wanted to do, and
it became everything pretty
quickly. We lasted fi ve years,
and it was amazing. But
where we were as people at
the end of it, I’m not sure.”
THE
BEGINNING
OF THE
(FIRST) ENDHOURGLASS
(FROM BABYLON AND ON, 1987)
Squeeze’s fi rst Top 20 hit since Labelled With
Love six years earlier, Hourglass could have
turned out a lot differently.
Chris: “Hourglass was the fi rst time Glenn and I tried
writing in the same room. There was a lot of cheese on
toast and cups of coffee. It was shy and standoffi sh.
Even now, when we co-write in the same house, we’re
usually in adjacent rooms with the door open. It doesn’t
have to be like that, but we’ve come so far down the
track it’d be hard to change our personalities.
We’re not quite as bad as The Everly Brothers for
fi ghting, but we’re also not exactly like Lennon
& McCartney. We’re somewhere in the middle.”
Glenn: “Hourglass? No, we wrote that separately. We wrote some of Some Fantastic Place in
the same room, when Chris had just come out of rehab. That was a new beginning for Chris
and for the two of us. As often happens in our relationship, something takes a sharp left turn
and off we go.”
Chris: “Dance music was very big at the time, and I realised there was the potential to try some
dance stuff. But Hourglass wouldn’t have worked if we’d tried to make it more like Chic, because
we’re not that band. We’re Squeeze. It’s the same as whenever we’ve tried to play reggae, it
makes me laugh. We do interpretations of other styles, but ultimately we are who we are.”
Glenn: “As I say, there’s a drift from Chris especially against that sort of dance thing in
Squeeze. The chorus of Hourglass is nonsense, but the rhythm of it works – that song is all about
the rhythmic delivery.”THE
WOULD-BE
DANCEFLOOR
SMASHSOME FANTASTIC PLACE
(FROM SOME FANTASTIC PLACE, 1993)
Although it only reached No.73, glorious ballad
Some Fantastic Place is many Squeeze fans’
favourite song. It was written as a tribute to
the band’s friend Maxine Barker, who died of
leukaemia aged just 36. Some Fantastic Place is
also the title of Chris’ acclaimed autobiography,
published in 2017.
Glenn: “Because it was obviously about Maxine,
there was a complete emotional connection.
As complicated as it is, Some Fantastic Place came
instantly. The inspiration was so magical, I almost
didn’t have to think about writing it at all. It’s a
wonderful song to do live.”
Chris: “Some Fantastic Place was one of the easiest songs I’ve ever written, it just came
gushing out. Squeeze don’t play it too often, but I do a different version in my solo set
which I really enjoy, especially if I’m playing in a church. I fi nd that hugely emotional.”
How did you come to name your book after the song? “I went through various
Squeeze song titles, and Some Fantastic Place sums my life up better than anything.
From a spiritual point of view, it worked. Glenn has read the book, but I don’t think
he’s enamoured with it. I’ve no idea why not, as I’m very open and honest about our
relationship in it. But it was written for me, not Glenn.”
Glenn: “Chris has his view and I have mine. It’s a great title, the book is fi ne, but what
I regret is that Chris didn’t give me suffi cient time to read it before publication.
He probably has his own reasons for doing that, but it wasn’t very courteous of him.”
Would you write a book? “That’s going to happen, without a shadow of a doubt.”THE
ULTIMATE FANS’
FAVOURITE”DANCE MUSIC WAS VERY BIG AT THE TIME, AND
I REALISED THERE WAS THE POTENTIAL TO TRY
SOME DANCE STUFF. BUT HOURGLASS WOULDN’T
HAVE WORKED IF WE’D TRIED TO MAKE IT MORE
LIKE CHIC, BECAUSE WE’RE NOT THAT BAND.
WE’RE SQUEEZE.”CHRIS DIFFORD© Rob O’Connor