COULD YOU STOP YOURSELF FROM FALLING?

Great single from 1981 here:



It's from the Beat's second album, Wha'ppen, in which they tone down the 2-tone and build up a fuller, more "world" sort of sound (a la Black Uhuru). Given the choice of obvious singles, "Drowning" is a lyrically and musically doomy song to play on Top of the Pops. But it did pretty well - not quite "Hands off she's mine," but it rung enough bells with recession-stricken England to get to number 22 in 1981.

This (inexplicably not released as a single) is even better - its anger packing even more of a punch because of its swagger and Saxa's dreamy, er, sax (NB: Lionle Martin was in his 50s when he played with these upstarts!)...