I really hate it when I mess up someone's name. Given how often I've heard and seen my own name misspelled and mispronounced over a span of decades, I'm certainly aware of the perceived slight of butchering a name, even with good intent. I try my best to get it right. When I fall short of that (as I often do), I apologize and quip that I'm following in the sometimes-clueless footsteps of Ed Sullivan introducing "Diane Warwick" on his really big shoe in the '60s.
But I feel bad when it happens, and it happened again on this week's shoe...er, show. Singer-songwriter Jared Lekites (of The Lunar Laugh) has a fantastic new record, Looking For Diamonds X, out on Kool Kat Musik. I wasn't previously familiar with Jared or with The Lunar Laugh, but I was taken with a swell pop track called "Looking For A Diamond," and we played it on Sunday night. Not knowing the pronunciation of the last name--I was, at least, okay with "Jared," I think--I looked at on-line bios and YouTube videos, but didn't really find anything that would help me say the name as it oughtta be said. I made the attempt anyway--we weren't gonna skip playing a great song just because I couldn't figure out how to say "Lekites"--and yeah, I screwed it up. I knew that I mispronounced it, and I apologized as I did. I'm still not sure how it should actually be pronounced, but I do know I said it wrong.
The music, though? Oh, the music sounds fabulous. It was worth embarrassing myself on-air just to grab the opportunity to play that song on the radio. Mr. Lekites, your intrepid TIRnRR hosts Donnie 'n' Earl apologize for the verbal error.
(We hear that Jared's currently trying to recover from COVID-19, and could use a little cash flow in the mean time. Pop fans may wanna visit jaredlekites.bandcamp.com and load up awready. Good music and a worthy benefit, no matter how you say it.)
Otherwise, we continued our pronounced dedication to the joy of radio, with more new music from our friends Irene Peña and The Brothers Steve, and our prerequisite barrage of cool things from The Jam, Paul Collins' Beat, Gladys Knight and the Pips, Nikki and the Corvettes, The Monkees, The Muffs, Chuck Berry, The Velvet Underground, Toots and the Maytals, and more. We opened with The Flashcubes expressing my own level of frustration in a song called "Got No Mind," and later played the one 2020 track whose title best summarizes this misbegotten year ("1-800-Colonoscopy" by Bill Berry). We did sight gags on the radio. Sometimes I think we're better at pulling off that quixotic quest than I am at, y'know, speaking on the radio. But we soldier on. The Best Three Hours Of Radio On The Whole Friggin' Planet? We can say that. Here's what that sounded like on a Sunday night in Syracuse this week.
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 all about this show's long and weird history here: Boppin' The Whole Friggin' Planet (The History Of THIS IS ROCK 'N' ROLL RADIO). TAX DEDUCTIBLE DONATIONS are always welcome.
Volume 1: download
Volume 2: CD or download
Volume 3: download
Volume 4: CD or download
Waterloo Sunset--Benefit For This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio: CD or download
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https://carlcafarelli.blogspot.com/
Hey, Carl's writin' a book! The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) will contain 165 essays about 165 songs, each one of 'em THE greatest record ever made. An infinite number of songs can each be the greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Updated initial information can be seen here.
TIRnRR # 1044: 9/27/2020
TIRnRR FRESH SPINS! Tracks we think we ain't played before are listed in bold.
THE RAMONES: Do You Remember Rock 'n' Roll Radio? (Rhino, End Of The Century)
LES HANDCLAPS: Cacti Are Delicious Fruit (Handclaps, Ouh Ouh Ah!)
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