That's Entertainment | |
Cover: | Jam-thatsentertainment1.jpg |
Type: | single |
Artist: | the Jam |
Album: | Sound Affects |
B-Side: | "Down in the Tube Station at Midnight" (live) |
Released: | 7 February 1981 |
Prev Title: | Start! |
Prev Year: | 1980 |
Next Title: | Funeral Pyre |
Next Year: | 1981 |
"That's Entertainment" is a 1980 song by British punk-mod revivalist group the Jam from their fifth album, Sound Affects.
Although never released as a domestic single in the UK during the band's lifetime, "That's Entertainment" nonetheless charted as an import single (backed by a live version of "Down in the Tube Station at Midnight"), peaking at No. 21.[1] It was given its first full UK release in 1983 and peaked at No. 60. A second reissue in 1991 also made the top 50.[1]
The song remains one of the two all-time biggest selling import singles in the UK, alongside the Jam's "Just Who Is the 5 O'Clock Hero?", which hit the charts at No. 8 as an import in 1982.[1]
"That's Entertainment" has been listed by BBC Radio 2 as the 43rd best song ever released by any artist.[2]
"That's Entertainment" is the group's lone entry, at No.306, on Rolling Stone's 500 Greatest Songs of All Time list released in 2004. It consistently makes similar British lists of all-time great songs, such as BBC Radio 2's "Sold on Song" 2004 Top 100, at No.43.[3]
The song uses an almost entirely acoustic arrangement with only very light percussion. Like much of Sound Affects, the song has strong undercurrents of pop-psychedelia. The only electric guitar part in the song is played backwards over one of the verses, a hallmark of psychedelia.
The minimalist, slice-of-life lyrics list various conditions of British working-class life. The first verse:
A police car and a screaming sirenculminating in the laconic and ironic refrain of "That's entertainment, That's entertainment"
Pneumatic drill and ripped-up concrete
A baby wailing, stray dog howling
The screech of brakes and lamp light blinking
"I was in London by the time I wrote 'That's Entertainment'," said Weller, "writing it was easy in a sense because all those images were at hand, around me."[4] In an interview with Absolute Radio he said: "I wrote it in 10 mins flat, whilst under the influence, I'd had a few but some songs just write themselves. It was easy to write, I drew on everything around me."[5]
That's Entertainment | |
Type: | single |
Artist: | Morrissey |
A-Side: | Sing Your Life |
Released: | [6] |
Length: | 3:58 |
Label: | HMV |
Prev Title: | Our Frank |
Prev Year: | 1990 |
Next Title: | Pregnant for the Last Time |
Next Year: | 1991 |
English singer Morrissey covered "That's Entertainment" in 1991. It was released as a B-side for his single "Sing Your Life" and was later included in . The song featured backing vocals from Chas Smash of Madness.