Subtle Knives and Subtle Digs - Asides (X)

'The Subtle Knife' was always going to be the litmus test for the BBC's adaptation. Would it dumb down the second novel in Philip Pullman's trilogy His Dark Materials? Would it flinch from tricky concepts that don't necessarily lend themselves to a galloping narrative? Dr. Mary Malone, introducing Lyra to Keats' concept of 'negative capability', allayed all of those fears. It is a fantastic and thrilling piece of television: erudite, daring, and entertaining.   

The Subtle Knife

What has surprised me, though, is the humour: sometimes playful, sometimes quite barbed. And a moment in the latest episode 'The Scholar' drew out a guilty belly-laugh. Lord Carlo Boreal, introducing Mrs Coulter to his Oxford flat (our Oxford), is rather proud of his sound-system. Boreal lazily lounges back into his sofa, and as the anodyne strains of The Lighthouse Family's 'Lifted' float around the minimalist basement, declares "The sound quality from these speakers is quite something." 

Mrs Coulter looks irritated. And as if to give my laughter a chance to subside, doesn't immediately pass judgement on the music. Eventually she cracks: "Carlo, can you make that stop?"  

It's a great bit of comic timing, but thinking about it later, and after an overly-pleased tweet, I started to blush. It's not that The Lighthouse Family are a terrible band. Indeed, my younger sailor self purchased that first album from an almost empty shopping mall in Kuwait City, and then listened to it as I sailed east across the Indian Ocean. Eventually, the scales slipped drowsily from my eyes and the music, like thinly buttered toast, inoffensive and insubstantial, launched the CD on an inevitable passage towards the charity shop.  

The reference is clearly a cruel bit of trolling by the show's writers. And it's also led me to speculate as to whether or not they chose that particularly band and song, or considered others that would have generated a similar impact, and perhaps one that better complemented Boreal's pomposity? Were Pink Floyd considered (I don't dislike Pink Floyd, but I don't adore them either)? Or, perhaps something from Dire Straits' ubiquitous HiFi marketing exercise Brothers in Arms (say 'Your Latest Trick', which, on listening again, is actually a fantastic song)? Or maybe - and here I think I've found what would have been my choice - The Best of Ultravox, with 'Vienna' swirling ominously around Boreal's louche Habitat sofa. Any other suggestions?