Just as Prufrock’s life was measured out in coffee spoons, and Eno’s life in shirts, some of us can say the same of Sparks songs. As Edgar Wright maintains, for those of a certain sensibility, these songs “invaded” their lives. Morrissey championed Sparks in a letter to the music press as an adolescent teen.
A decade ago I interviewed Boy George, and he made the point that Sparks have even influenced those who are unaware of the original source of the influence. Born in the same era, the two of us found ourselves citing examples, listing the songs that had invaded our lives. For me, a key lyric is in the 1974 single “Never Turn Your Back On Mother Earth” from Propaganda. Here’s why: I first met the brothers in London in the early-1990s, between their lengthy and unsuccessful attempts to bring their musical version of the Manga Mai The Psychic Girl to the screen, under the aegis of Tim Burton, and their beginning work on the underrated album Gratuit…