My Top 1000 Songs #657: Anything Could Happen

[I've been writing up my Top 1000 songs on a daily basis--you can see them all in descending order by hitting the All My Favorite Songs tag.] 

Pretty much every song on The Clean's 1986 collection of early singles--helpfully titled Compilation--is damn near perfect, raggedly half-assed post-punk shambles that somehow make DIY garage rock sound like high art. So why "Anything Could Happen"? Hard to say. I've already posted another track off the same 1981 Boodle Boodle Boodle EP where this one originated, the raging Velvet-y rocker "Point That Thing Somewhere Else," so maybe I should be looking more broadly? Perhaps. But there's something about the slack, spare "Anything" that captivates me. A basic, jangly three-chord riff, held down by the punchy bass of Robert Scott (who serves double-duty as frontman of The Bats), and some silly lyrics that feel (and, as sung by David Kilgour, sound) a bit like Bob Dylan on a cough syrup bender.

"Come on, doctor, won't you give me a shot? Feeling cold, boy, feeling hot. Doctor said, 'No, boy, you've gotta learn. First I'll shoot up and then it's your turn.'"

But mostly, it just sounds like the sort of song I could see myself playing--three chords is just about right!--if I ever got around to forming a band.

Live in Vegas, 2012 (hey! I was there in that crowd! I think I see myself!):

Surprising cover from MGMT!