1965 The Hollies: I'm Alive

A typical 'beat' single from a typical sixties 'beat' group, 'I'm Alive' was written to order for a band looking for their first number one. It's a lively stomp, but it's structure has always seemed a bit lop sided to these ears; the verses shake the lemonade bottle and build the pressure splendidly ("Now I can breathe, I can see, I can touch, I can feel, I can taste all the sugar sweetness in your kiss") only for the chorus pay-off to splutter like a wet fuse and only partly unscrew the top to let that pressure out.

That's one black mark anyway, but another is the song's central theme of being 'awoken' from a loveless stupor. Fine in theory, but the presentation here has always rung a little too self satisfied and pleased with itself for my tastes. "I used to think I was living, baby I was wrong. No I never knew a thing about living 'til you came along" - it's directness makes it too obvious to warrant stating and the lack of any underwritten subtlety cheapens the analogy until it becomes non existent - would 'Here Comes The Sun' been as effective if Harrison had followed in the next line with 'and now I'm nice and warm'? Of course not.* Luckily, Allan Clarke's vocal is as self conscious as a hyperactive child with a new toy and he injects his cries of 'I'm alive, I'm aaalliivveee' with the enthusiasm of someone crawling from the wreckage after a motorway pile up. It's ham acting for sure, but it's hard to begrudge him his joy and ultimately, it's as hard to begrudge the song as it is that squawking kid. I blame the parents myself.


* A far better example of this kind of thing is Abba's final single 'The Day Before You Came' where Agnetha sets out in painful detail the tedium of her daily life ("I must have left my house at eight, because I always do. My train, I'm certain, left the station just when it was due. I must have read the morning paper going into town" etc etc) and how it's all changed now that 'he' is on the scene. What the song doesn't tell us is whether her life is now a bowl of cherries as a couple, of if all the newcomer has done is exposed her to the painful self awareness that her previous contentment was built on a soulless vacuum.