1001 Songs Challenge #861: Come to Daddy (Pappy Mix) (1997)

On 11 February 2019 I set myself the challenge of reading 1001 Songs You Must Hear Before You Die by Robert Dimery (ed.) and following the book’s advice to the letter. I’ve previously read 1001 Films… and started 1001 Albums… but felt 1001 Songs… would be a sensible place to start for what I have in mind here.

My challenge is to read about one song per day and listen to it (YouTube and Spotify, I need you tonight!) before sharing my own thoughts. Some songs I will love, others I’ll hate, and I’m sure there will be those that leave me perplexed but listen to them I shall.

I’ll also try, and most likely fail, to pinpoint the best song from the 1001 on offer but I’m nothing if not foolhardy. Instead of one song, I’m predicting I’ll have about 100 favourites by the end and may have to resort to a Top 10 so far to maintain any semblance of sanity.

So long as I post every day (including Christmas) then this challenge should come to an end on Wednesday 8 November 2021. Staying with the Barney Stinson theme I am hoping that the whole experience will prove to be… legendary!

Aphex Twin – Come to Daddy (Pappy Mix) (1997)

We’re remaining in the UK today, dear reader. Richard David James, alias Aphex Twin, was originally born in Limerick in the Republic of Ireland but he was actually raised in Cornwall, hence our continued stay here in the UK. He began his career in the 1980s focusing on electronic, techno and experimental numbers. We join him in 1997 with the release of the single, Come to Daddy, which gets the nod from 1001 Songs today.

Come to Daddy is rumoured to have been Aphex Twin’s way of showing Prodigy how to approach their hit song, Firestarter. What credence this has is open to debate with Aphex Twin not committing to this version of events. The song itself is lyrically limited with the narrator singing eerily about wanting to devour someone’s soul and then using that refrain of “come to daddy”. The track is more about the music which contains some truly frantic drumming while the vocals themselves are distorted and unnerving. I understand an accompanying music video is supposed to be rather chilling to sit through.

Come to Daddy is an interesting experiment from Aphex Twin though I didn’t initially make any connection with Firestarter and this seems open to debate online from what I have read. The song would fare well, landing in the UK Top 40, but there were rumours that Aphex Twin briefly withdrew the track from circulation to avoid it going to no.1. Despite the song’s success he found the whole thing rather peculiar that this of all tracks gained the traction that it did. Music happens like that sometimes.

Favourite songs so far:

The Animals – House of the Rising Sun (1964)

Simon & Garfunkel – The Sounds of Silence (1965)

The Beatles – A Day in the Life (1967)

The Doors – The End (1967)

Pink Floyd – Wish You Were Here (1975)

Meat Loaf – Bat Out of Hell (1977)

Tracy Chapman – Fast Car (1988)

U2 – One (1991)

Jeff Buckley – Hallelujah (1994)

Radiohead – Paranoid Android (1997)