From The Beatles to Pink Floyd: My Desert Island Discs

Ian Malin

Go on. You’ve all done it. Who hasn’t fantasised about being the castaway on Desert Island Discs? Who hasn’t listened in and tut-tutted at the naff selections of some of its guests or admired the good taste of others? I’m sorry to inflict this on everyone. It’s about talking about the dream you had last night. Literally nobody is interested (well, they are really).

Here are my eight discs to take to the island. In truth, they are only the eight today because this list is constantly changing. The first and last fit in with the theme of life on the island and the fifth and the sixth about family memories. And the beauty of doing Desert Island Discs this way is you don’t have to tell Lauren Laverne about whether you were happy in your childhood.

Looking at my eight choices two things are obvious. Most of the selections are from the Seventies, the golden age of the album, and most of them, I think, will have a narcotic effect on me, like the lotus eaters of the myth. If you listen to these eight every day of your lonely life as you search for ship smoke on the horizon, life could be just about bearable…

Here Comes The Sun: The Beatles (1969)

There has to be something by The Beatles. This is not one of the biggies. It’s not Strawberry Fields Forever, Eleanor Rigby or A Day In The Life. But George Harrison’s opening track on Abbey Road would be perfect as the sun came up and you were taking those fishing rods down to the shore. HCTS would make you optimistic about the day ahead. It’s lovely for its artless simplicity with its piping moog synthesiser and upbeat lyric.

You’re A Big Girl Now: Bob Dylan (1973)

If you only own one album by Bob Dylan it should be Blood on the Tracks. This is almost overpowering in its emotional intensity. Who but Dylan could write a line like ‘I’m going out of my mind, oh, with a pain that stops and starts, like a corkscrew to my heart. Ever since we’ve been apart’? It’s a perfect expression of hopelessness and isolation. As one reviewer wrote at the time ‘like watching your father cry for the first time’.

Banks of the Nile: Fotheringay (1970)

Liege & Leaf is always considered the crowning achievement of Fairport Convention when Sandy Denny was in her pomp. I think Fotheringay, the only album she recorded with the group after leaving Fairport, gives it a run for its money. It won’t change your mood after the Dylan weepie but this eight-minute epic, a traditional tale of a romance torn apart by the Napoleonic Wars, is a perfect showcase for Denny’s superb, heart-rending vocal.

Near You: Courtney Marie Andrews (2017)

This is the only track recorded this century. The Arizona singer-songwriter moved to Nashville during the Covid epidemic and hasn’t recorded much, to my knowledge, since. The ballad has never appeared on an album but its tale of a love so obsessive is quite scary. Those vibrato-tinged vocals absolutely soar with emotion. Andrews is never afraid to write about lost love and this is one of her best.

Dream Away: Frank Sinatra (1973)

The first of two tracks that remind me of my past rather than just being great tracks. My mother, like all women of her generation, was attracted to Sinatra like iron filings to a magnet. He released Ol’ Blue Eyes Is Back in the early Seventies. Mum bought it and, like a teenager, pinned the photo inside the sleeve to her bedroom wall. I don’t think my dad minded too much. This Paul Williams-penned song is perfect for the velvet-voiced one.

Near Wild Heaven: REM (1991)

The other track to be inspired by family. When our children were young we listened and sang along to a lot of music in the car. Often it was Bruce Springsteen or REM. And when I hear this I can see their little heads bobbing in the rear-view mirror as Michael Stipe and Athens, Georgia’s finest chirp away through this perfect jangly pop, ‘like frosting on a cherry pie’ in the words of one critic.

Into White: Cat Stevens (1971)

Carly Simon chose this song from the Tea For The Tillerman album when she really did appear on Desert Island Discs. She recorded it too. It’s as delicate as a gossamer cobweb in autumn and I would think of an English country garden as I looked at all that sand around me. There are various interpretations about its meaning. It could be about death. Or the white light could just be that refracted through a prism. Either way it’s lovely and the strings enhance the song wonderfully.

Eclipse: Pink Floyd (1973)

And talking of light and prisms, at the end of the day the final track on Dark Side Of The Moon would help me drift off to sleep and as I lay there looking up at the stars in a cloudless sky while I sipped a glass of the champagne I had asked Lauren Laverne for as my luxury item. Thinking of my insignificant place in the universe this would be the hopeful note at the end of another endless day.

… and that’s the eight. I’d probably rescue Here Comes The Sun from the waves while I’m reading the collected works of Dickens. Must dash now. That was the phone. It could be Lauren.

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