How would you improve Crazy Beat?

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The only thing that does my head in is the second verse. "Come on Bush, party with me, lets do drugs!" I know the whole thing is tongue in cheek, but for fuck sake.

The rest of it sounds like 2000s Fatboy Slim with added post-punk revival though. Not bad at all.

But, regardless, whenever I think of Think Tank, I kinda think of the song as this sad little blip that stops it from being a classic, and that's only because you hate it so. So, in order for Think Tank to become a classic (no comments about it never being one without Graham etc.), how would you actually re-arrange the song altogether?

And sure, Donald Duck and yeah yeah yeahs will come up a lot, but those are fiiiine

[Lt Pinkerton]

Denying its existence as I've been doing for the last 10 years.


Seriously though, what I find extremely annoying about Crazy Beat is how uninteresting the instrumental track is. There's nothing fun going on about it, not even Alex's bass - and I think we can all agree that there isn't a Blur album with better basslines than Think Tank. It sounds like something they wrote and recorded in five minutes, and not in a good way as in, say, Ong Ong. Also, Damon's vocal delivery doesn't fit the song's style at all, he's sounding tired and boring in what's supposed to be an uplifting tune. But even if it had been recorded properly, it still wouldn't fit in Think Tank, an album in which every upbeat song arguably has something experimental and groovy about it.

[daii]

I think it would be a much better song if you take off the annoying "crazy beat, crazy beat yeah yeah". I can't stand it. Really. I hate it. When I listen to think tank is the only song I skip.

[MsMagicAmerica]

Denying its existence as I've been doing for the last 10 years.

Same here.

What would I change? Well, I'd get rid of the Crazy Beats, the Yeah yeah yeahs, the Donald Duck voice, and of fuck it all of the damn song.

[Pasta]

Put it in the bin

[Daysleeper]

The song doesn't have many, if any redeeming features!

Dire lyrics, lazy musicianship, terrible Donald ducks and yeah yeah yeahs.

A real embarrassment to the band, Damon said as much himself.

My least favourite Blur song.

[davidsutter]

The demo from 2001 that evolved into it sounded alright.
I'd scrap what exists, go back to that and try to create something else from it.

[Consigliere_11]

Whoa, people really hate Crazy Beat. I mean, I don't like it, but I still listen to it every time.

For me, the problem is in the positioning - it follows melancholic and much slower "Out of Time", which is rather annoying - the first two tracks of the record put you in a mellow mood and than out of nowhere there is this crazy guitar and duck voice. Not the most pleasant experience. But I think, it would sit nicely somewhere around "We've Got a File on You" - the latter could be a sort of an outro.

And, it can't fixed by now, but I think that they shouldn't have released it as a single. Much of a negative reception comes from the fact that is should have been one of the record's leading songs - but it clearly isn't.

[davidsutter]

You know how weaksauce one-hit wonders often try to remake their big song and end up making everything about it worse?
That's what Crazy Beat sounds like, if you only knew it and Song 2 that's what you'd think Blur is.

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So how would you improve Think Tank in that respect? If CB wasn't on it, then what song would take its place?

[bugman]

still id like to hear a version with alternative lyrics and without norman cook. i know that they recorded this version

[101reykjavik]

So how would you improve Think Tank in that respect? If CB wasn't on it, then what song would take its place?

The thing is, TT is 13 tracks so you could easily just ditch it and still have a perfectly acceptable 12 track album, so I probably wouldn't replace it with anything.

[Consigliere_11]

Money Makes Me Crazy could potentially replace it. I think the song could even be a minor hit.

[Mrbriggs]

Money Makes Me Crazy could potentially replace it. I think the song could even be a minor hit.

This is what I was thinking too. That way there's still a catchy, upbeat song on the album, except this one is actually good.

[MsMagicAmerica]

If I had to replace it with something, I personally like "Don't Be"