This is the second of two separate editions of 10 Songs this week, each drawing exclusively from the playlist for This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio # 1025.
MICHAEL CARPENTER AND MICHAEL OLIVER: It Only Hurts When I Breathe
Both Michael Carpenter and Michael Oliver have been long-time Fave Raves on TIRnRR, so it makes perfect sense that we should fall so fully for their new collaboration "It Only Hurts When I Breathe." We've been playing these guys for years, as solo artists and under group titles (Carpenter singing lead for The Finkers as well as with a series of his own combos like Michael Carpenter and the Cuban Heels, Oliver fronting Michael Oliver and Go, Dog, Go!), and they really oughtta be household names already. They've appeared on TIRnRR compilations, and each of their contributions has been a stunning highlight; hell, when I heard Oliver's This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4 submission "You Won't Do," I immediately contacted Dana and Kool Kat Musik's Ray Gianchetti to tell them we'd just received a track that would single-handedly justify our project. Stunning stuff, and the Michaels offer rich catalogs of music that will delight you. You can get "It Only Hurts When I Breathe" right here.
DAVE EDMUNDS: Queen Of Hearts
Even though I already owned Dave Edmunds' Repeat When Necessary album (purchased specifically to snag Edmunds' extraordinary cover of Elvis Costello's "Girls Talk") well before Juice Newton's "Queen Of Hearts" hit radio in 1981, I didn't immediately realize that this fabulous Juice Newton single was a cover of a song on Repeat When Necessary. Oops? That happens sometimes; I get preoccupied with one track--"Girls Talk" in this case--and forget about the rest of the album. I am as God made me. I admit the heresy of digging Juice Newton's version even more than the Edmunds original, but man, you can't go wrong with either version.
THE FIRST CLASS: Beach Baby
I know that "Beach Baby" by The First Class occasionally shows up on some folks' lists of the all-time worst hit songs, but I must respectfully disagree. "Beach Baby" is an amazing evocation of the mythic California sound, executed by a British studio group, pulling the whole magic trick off without ever sounding like a Beach Boys imitation. Tony Burrows sings lead, and Dana and I like to refer to Burrows as the world's only five-time one-hit wonder, since he also lent his voice to the sole Billboard smashes credited to Edison Lighthouse ("Love Grows [Where My Rosemary Goes]"), White Plains ("My Baby Loves Lovin'"), The Brotherhood Of Man ("United We Stand"), and The Pipkins ("Gimme Dat Ding"). "Beach Baby" is Burrows' finest moment. One of the all-time worst? Please. "Beach Baby" earns its own chapter in my eventual book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1).
THE HEARTBREAKERS: Love Comes In Spurts
Although I was a teenage punk fan in 1977, I didn't have much enthusiasm for Richard Hell and the Voidoids. I loved The Sex Pistols and The Ramones, and I appreciated the naughtiness of a title like "Love Comes In Spurts," but even when I won a free copy of the Voidoids' debut album Blank Generation from my college campus radio station, I could find no reason to keep it in my collection.
Before the Voidoids, Hell had been bassist with The Heartbreakers, the legendarily disheveled group fronted by The New York Dolls' former guitarist Johnny Thunders. Hell was long gone from The Heartbreakers by the time of their lone studio album L.A.M.F., but Dana pulled out this 1975 demo of Hell 'n' Heartbreakers for airplay on this week's show. Musically, this earlier version of "Love Comes In Spurts" sounds a lot more like The Heartbreakers' subsequent L.A.M.F. track "One Track Mind"--one of my three favorite Heartbreakers cuts--than it does to the familiar Voidoids recording of the same song. And I like it a lot.
HÜSKER DÜ: Eight Miles High
Given my general affinity for melody and disdain for noise, Dana was surprised to discover how much I like Hüsker Dü's chaotic cover of The Byrds' "Eight Miles High." The Byrds' 1966 recording of "Eight Miles High" was probably the first Byrds record I ever owned, an oldies reissue 45 purchased when I was still a high school student in the mid '70s. I was (and remain) taken with the audacity and ambition The Byrds brought to the original, mixing their well-known vocal blend with an adventurous arrangement intended to adapt the free-form improvisational style of jazz saxophonist John Coltrane to a pop song played by an American folk-rock guitar band at the height of the British Invasion..
If there was a subtle embrace of cacophony inherent in The Byrds' creation of "Eight Miles High," Hüsker Dü grabs the noisier elements in a freakin' headlock, wringing out every bit of grunge and distortion to be found. On paper, I shouldn't dig this, and should probably hate it. But I've loved it for decades, ever since hearing it on Buffalo's WBNY-FM in the mid '80s and snappin' up my copy of the 45 from visionary rock writer Gary Sperrazza! at Apollo Records. As much as I still adore The Byrds' version, Hüsker Dü's cover has become my preferred take on "Eight Miles High."
THE MONKEES: The Door Into Summer
I like The Monkees. Their new live album The Mike & Micky Show is just fantastic, and this is its best track. Wonderfully played by a superb group of musicians (who, again, REALLY NEED TO RECORD A NEW MONKEES STUDIO ALBUM!), expertly and lovingly reproduced for your home enjoyment. Michael Nesmith is in fine voice, Micky Dolenz is always in fine voice, and I'm sorry, but I can't stop talking about how great their band sounds with them. New studio album. Now. Please?
MÖTORHEAD: RAMONES
I think I read about this song (from Mötorhead's 1991 album 1916) somewhere in the rock press, certainly long before I heard the track itself. My introduction to Mötorhead's music came back in the '70s, when their blistering track "Motorhead" was included on a sampler album called Geef Voor New Wave, a compilation that also included tracks by The Rubinoos, The Motors, Johnny Moped, Eddie and the Hot Rods, The Adverts, Generation X, Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Jonathon Richman, The Sex Pistols, The Dwight Twilley Band, The Radiators From Space, Radio Stars, and Earth Quake. Geef Voor New Wave was one hell of a collection, and my copy of that LP has withstood every attempted purge of excess items in my vinyl collection. I still have that record, and it deserves a separate post of its own some day.
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| My Geef Voor New Wave and me. Evidence suggests this is a recent photo. |
"Ace Of Spades" is probably the best-known Mötorhead track overall, and I heard that in the early '80s, probably not all that long after its 1980 release. I dug the idea of Mötorhead--grungy, unapologetic hard rock that was both punk and metal while violently shrugging off any attempt to categorize it--more than I really listened to them. But I loved the song "Motorhead," and I liked "Ace Of Spades" a lot.
I first heard Mötorhead's own original salute to The Ramones as a cover by--of course!--The Ramones themselves. The Carbona Quartet recorded two versions of the song, with bassist C. J. Ramone singing lead on their first released version (on 1995's ¡Adios Amigos!), and Joey Ramone resuming his usual place at the microphone for a studio cut on the 1996 album Greatest Hits Live. The Ramones included the song in their final live performance, August 6th of '96, with shared lead vocals by C.J. and Mötorhead's Lemmy (documented on the 1997 live album We're Outta Here!). I finally grabbed a copy of 1916 to hear the Mötorhead version after that. It's my favorite Mötorhead song. Duh.
THE MYNAH BIRDS: I Got You (In My Soul)
The Mynah Birds appear in 10 Songs for the second consecutive week. The historical hook for this lost 1966 Motown group is that it included both Rick James and Neil Young before they were famous, but honestly, I'm caring less and less about that curiosity. This stuff just cooks, and it's a shame it wasn't released in the '60s. A total of four tracks have been made available on digital compilations, and if there's still any more left in the vaults, I hope someone exhumes it all soon. I would buy a Mynah Birds CD right now, if only such a thing existed.
POPDUDES: Ridin' In My Car
Popdudes' ace cover of NRBQ's "Ridin' In My Car" returns to the playlist and to 10 Songs, as the track (previously available only as a digital single) is now available for the first time as a physical product. The occasion is the release of the brand-new compilation CD Big Stir Singles--The Sixth Wave, which collects virtual As and Bs from Popdudes, Librarians With Hickeys, Dolph Chaney, Jim Basnight, The Walker Brigade, Paula Carino, Joe Normal and the Anytown'rs, Trip Wire, The Corner Laughers, and Spygenius, a double A-side of XTC covers by Glowbox and Tom Curless and the 46%, plus The Well Wishers' fab "We Grow Up." 23 tracks! Good stuff! And a good cause, with 25% of the proceeds benefiting Sweet Relief's Musician Assistance Fund. Radio's job is to sell records; we've done our part, so now do yours: Big Stir Records compilations
THE STEMS: Never Be Friends
This week's playlist was dominated by our tribute to the late Little Richard. The pop world also lost Richard Lane, who had been a founding member of an absolutely incredible Australian pop group called The Stems. The Stems--Lane, Dom Mariani, Julian Matthews, and David Shaw--released one brilliant album, 1987's At First Sight Violets Are Blue before combusting. I can't get along with you/I can't can't get along with you/I can't get along with you/I can't get along with you. The album included this exuberant power pop kiss-off "Never Be Friends," and the song's verve and swagger shines on the radio, where it belongs.
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This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl airs Sunday nights from 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse at SPARK! WSPJ 103.3 and 93.7 FM, and on the web at http://sparksyracuse.org/ You can read about our history here.
The many fine This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio compilation albums are still available, each full of that rockin' pop sound you crave. A portion of all sales benefit our perpetually cash-strapped community radio project:
Volume 1: download
Volume 3: download
Waterloo Sunset--Benefit For This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio: CD or download
Carl's writin' a book! The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) will contain 134 essays about 134 tracks, each one of 'em THE greatest record ever made. An infinite number of records can each be the greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Updated initial information can be seen here: THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (Volume 1).
Carl's writin' a book! The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) will contain 134 essays about 134 tracks, each one of 'em THE greatest record ever made. An infinite number of records can each be the greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Updated initial information can be seen here: THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (Volume 1).
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