10 Songs is a weekly list of ten songs that happen to be on my mind at the moment. Given my intention to usually write these on Mondays, the lists are often dominated by songs played on the previous night's edition of This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl. The idea was inspired by Don Valentine of the essential blog I Don't Hear A Single.
For this week's epic July 4th blowout, we presented a countdown of TIRnRR's 55 all-time most played artists, with each artist's all-time # 1 most-played track. Thanks again to the mighty Fritz Van Leaven for programming the countdown. And in the spirit of the countdown, we'll have three editions of 10 Songs this week, celebrating our 30 most-played acts with their most-played songs. As befits a greatest-hits revue, most of the individual song entries have been seen before on this blog, with maybe a couple of previously-unreleased selections as needed.
This first of this week's three celebratory 10 Songs begins with our 30th all-time most-played artist.
30. CHUCK BERRY: PROMISED LAND
Chuck Berry knew well the travails of the downtrodden. Dark skin, humble origin, destined to transcend all and everything to become the single most important performer in the history of rock 'n' roll. His mind was quick, his fingers precise, wedding intricate, unforgettable wordplay to a guitar he played like a-ringin' a bell. He struggled. He pushed. He got noticed. He got pushed back. He kept pushing back in turn, smiling and duck-walking, while quietly seething behind his flamboyant mask. A nice man? Tough to say, but beside the point. An important man? If you've ever loved rock 'n' roll, you should be ashamed to even ask that question.
Berry built the foundation (and much of the walls) of his legacy in the '50s, when segregation was commonplace throughout much of this Land of the Free, when failure to mind one's place wasn't just a breach of protocol; it was a de facto criminal act.
Into this tinderbox, Chuck Berry brought black music that made white kids dance. He wrote in code--most famously, the irresistibly potent brown-skinned handsome man became (wink) a brown-eyed handsome man, man--but he crafted and chronicled the American teen-age dream with greater eloquence than anyone, black or white. It was inevitable that he would be slapped down.
Some say that he mighta had it coming. Maybe. Others say the rap was racially-motivated, pure and simple. Berry was busted for a violation of the Mann Act, transporting a minor across a state line for immoral purpose. It's plausible to suggest that Berry may have been guilty, but it's also plausible that he wasn't. Guilty or not, Berry spent a year and a half behind bars. While still a guest of the state, Berry wrote "Promised Land."
Fitting.
With its music adapted from the traditional "Wabash Cannonball," Berry's "Promised Land" tells the tale of a poor boy from Norfolk, Virginia following his dream west, chasing a vision of prosperity and bliss in the same mythic paradise sought by Tom Joad, sought by some members of my own family: California. The Promised Land.
The road to the promised land is laden with setbacks, peril, like the Greyhound that had motor trouble that turned into a struggle half-way across Alabam', 'til that hound broke down and left 'em all stranded in downtown Birmingham. But there is also deliverance: a through train ticket from Birmingham to New Orleans, hitchhikin' to loved ones in Houston, who--sure as you're born!--won't let the poor boy down: new silk suit, luggage in his hand, he wakes up high over Albuquerque on a jet to the promised land.
It's the wee wee hours at the end of 1964. The Beatles and the Animals and the Rolling Stones are already in the process of reminding everyone that "Chuck Berry" and "rock 'n' roll" are the same damned thing, and they won't let the poor boy down, either. He's seen the promised land. We've all seen the promised land. We feel its warmth, taste its sweet sense of liberty, of possibility. Freedom. Tell the folks back home this is the promised land calling, and the poor boy is on the line.
29. THE GRIP WEEDS: Every Minute
The Grip Weeds have certainly been a long-standing, consistent favorite on This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio for many years now. I heard the group for the first time via legendary power pop performer Paul Collins.
Collins' connection was tangential, really. A label called Wagon Wheel Records was formed in the early '90s by Collins and Rick Wagner, and Wagon Wheel released the Paul Collins Band's From Town To Town CD in 1993, and subsequently also reissued Collins' first two classic Beat albums. Wagon Wheel's final CD release (I think) before shutting down in the late '90s was a 1995 pop compilation called Pop Matters. Pop Matters served as my introduction to the music of Jeremy (whose own label JAM Recordings would eventually put out the first two TIRnRR comps), the Tearaways, Big Hello, the Rockinghams, and the Hippycrickets, and my first Cockeyed Ghost CD track (that group's Adam Marsland had already treated me to some prime Cockeyed Ghost material on mix tapes). Pop Matters opened with a song called "Salad Days," and that was the first time I heard the Grip Weeds.
Beyond that, the chronology of my rapid and total indoctrination into the blissful Grip of Weedsmania blurs. I may have become more interested via the group's connection with the Rooks, another of the great pop bands of the '90s. Rooks guitarist Kristin Pinell was (and is) also in the Grip Weeds. Kristin's husband Kurt Reil was (and is) the drummer and lead singer for the Grip Weeds, and he played with the Rooks, too. I don't know whether or not guitarist Rick Reil also served any Rooks time, but either way: the Grip Weeds seemed like a band I oughtta know.
And getting to know the Grip Weeds was its own sweet reward.
The Grip Weeds made their TIRnRR debut on our third show, 1/10/99, with a spin of "Out Of Today" from their debut album House Of Vibes. We've never really ceased playing them since then. Why should we? Why would we? Across a span of great Grip Weeds albums--The Sound Is In You, Summer Of A Thousand Years, Giant On The Beach, Strange Change Machine, How I Won The War, the best-of set Infinite Soul, the holiday offering Under The Influence Of Christmas, the in-concert Speed Of Live, the rarities collection Inner Grooves--the group has given us a wealth of rockin' pop treasure to play with, and to just plain play. "Every Minute." "I Believe." "Save My Life." "Rainbow Quartz." "It Ain't No Big Thing, Babe" (a particular favorite of Dana's). Two different versions of "Rainy Day." "Truth (Is Hard To Take)." Ace covers of the Knickerbockers' "Lies." the Monkees' "For Pete's Sake," and (most recently) the Beach Boys' "You're So Good To Me." These are but a handful of the terrific Grip Weeds tracks that have earned repeated berths on TIRnRR playlists.
"Every Minute" may be my favorite. And it is definitely our most-played Grip Weeds track.
28. THE MUFFS: Saying Goodbye
For a very long time, "Saying Goodbye" by the Muffs was my top track of the '90s, and I'm not sure that's changed since then. The song came from the group's eponymous debut album in 1993, an album I reviewed for Goldmine:
"There is a current branch of chaotic pop--call it melodic thrash, or bubblegrunge, or bash and pop (to steal the name of Tommy Stinson's new group)--that seems to draw equal inspiration from the New York Dolls, KISS, the Ramones, the Runaways, and the Buzzcocks, though the Replacements are the most obvious common reference point. It's a broad category, and it includes to some extent the Goo Goo Dolls, Star Star, various ex-Replacements, and even Nirvana's 'Smells Like Teen Spirit.'
"The Muffs' debut album is squarely of that strain, and it's a right exhilarating whiff of same. The Muffs include Kim Shattuck and Melanie Vammen, two former members of the Pandoras, whose best work deserved a wider audience. Shattuck and Vammen have traded in their respective bass and keyboard duties for lead and rhythm guitars here, and Shattuck does most of the lead vocals. Bassist Ronnie Bartnett and drummer Criss Crass are the token males.
"The Muffs' 16 tracks jump up and down with manic glee, characterized by amphetamine-fueled rhythm and punk-pop hooks. It's an immediate improvement over all of the Pandoras' work since 1986's Stop Pretending, and it's a righteous, rowdy good time. Key tracks include 'Saying Goodbye'--a rockin' delight that would be getting saturation airplay right now in a world more just than our own--plus 'Don't Waste Another Day' and 'Eye To Eye,' each of which is as close to a power ballad as the Muffs are likely to come. The acoustic 'All For Nothing' closes the show in style (with an unnamed 20-second hardcore thrash serving as an unbilled encore). Anyone who mourns the demise of the Pandoras, or who simply enjoys the the thrill of a pop-rock assault with intent to kill, will be well-served here."
27. THE VELVET UNDERGROUND: Who Loves The Sun
(That line was marginally funnier when I used it last year. Marginally.)
25 [tie]. THE FLAMIN' GROOVIES: Shake Some Action
In the spring of 1978, I heard a compilation LP called New Wave. The record included a few tracks I already knew (by the Ramones, the Runaways, and Richard Hell & the VoidOids), a great Talking Heads track I didn't know, and a few other things that were new to me, too (including stuff by the Damned and the Dead Boys). And, of course, New Wave included a Flamin' Groovies song called "Shake Some Action."
"Shake Some Action."
I consider myself fortunate to be the sort of wide-eyed pop fan that can sometimes fall in love with a song or a band instantly. It doesn't always work that way, but when it does, it's magic. It was magic when I heard "Sheena Is A Punk Rocker" by the Ramones. It was magic when I saw the Flashcubes live. And it was magic when I heard "Shake Some Action."
The song was just...hypnotic. There were so many little elements combining and clashing within that track, with bits of the Byrds and Phil Spector, a brooding, booming bass, guitars that seemed to snarl and jangle at the same time, punk swagger, pop yearning, and an insistent instrumental hook that grabbed me and whispered silkily in my ear, You're with us now, son. It was a recipe for cacophony, a surefire roadmap to a sonic mess...except that it wasn't. It was precise. It was perfect. And I swear, in that moment, I knew it was The Greatest Record Ever Made.
25 [tie]. THE DAVE CLARK FIVE: Any Way You Want It
A Wall of Noise.
When I think of the British Invasion, I think of the Beatles in 1964, of course; but the first two songs that come to my mind aren't Beatle tunes; they're "You Really Got Me" by the Kinks and "Glad All Over" by the Dave Clark Five. Those two singles sum up rabid, frenzied Fabmania even better than any moptop-shakin' Yeah Yeah Yeah! In '64, the game was accelerating faster and faster, with every Beatles, DC5, or Kinks 45 upping the ante for contested spots on the pop charts and notches on the transistor radio's volume control. Rule, Britannia.
In this dizzying environment, the Dave Clark Five delivered a single with a massive, monolithic, moving Wall Of Noise like nothing else: "Any Way You Want It." Hearing it on the radio must have felt like a blackjack to the skull. There were no highs or lows, no peaks or valleys in its sound, just a solid, sonic whoooooosh to knock you over. The record pummels you, and assumes command of your body, soul, tapping feet, and feverish, air-drummin' arms. Whoooooosh. Whomp. Any way you want it, that's the way it will be.
In our far-future world here in the 21st century, with our jetpacks and our flyin' cars and...wait, we don't really have any of those. Still, it's difficult to look back and truly appreciate how radical and new this must have sounded in 1964. A Wall Of Noise. For two and a half minutes, "Any Way You Want It" is the only song in the world, the only song that's ever been, the only song that matters. Years later, both KISS and the Ramones--two acts more than capable of capturing Wow! on wax--would release covers of "Any Way You Want It," and neither could come within light years of the DC5's original version.
24. THE BAY CITY ROLLERS: Wouldn't You Like It
When I was in college in the late '70s, I had a friend named Jane, who was a DJ on the Brockport campus radio station. We hung out together a few times, including one night when I kibbitzed with her in the studio while she did her radio show. And I requested one specific song....
By the end of the Me Decade, former teen idols the Bay City Rollers were persona non grata to the buying public, an embarrassing relic of adolescence for those (mostly female) fans who'd outgrown their puppy-eyed crushes on this Tartan-clad combo. And most music lovers who identified as older, male, hipper, and/or more mature just despised the Rollers all along.
But not me. Once I learned to ignore the ludicrous notion of the Rollers as the next Beatles, I found that I liked some of the Rollers' records just fine, thanks. I was especially taken with "Rock And Roll Love Letter" and "Yesterday's Hero." When I became aware of the notion of power pop, I was delighted to learn that the writers of Bomp! magazine included the Bay City Rollers as at least a tangent to that discussion.
I saw the Rollers lip-sync an album track called "Wouldn't You Like It" on the Midnight Special TV show, and I was instantly captivated by its power-chord riffs, chugging rhythm, and sheer overall oomph. My interest in the Rollers wasn't then sufficient to prompt me to buy many of their records--I had the "Rock And Roll Love Letter" and "Saturday Night" 45s, and the Dedication and It's A Game LPs--but my girlfriend's pal Debi was an unrepentant Rollers fan; she had the Rock And Roll Love Letter album, and played "Wouldn't You Like It" for me. Man, what a great track.
So some time later, when I was chilling with mi amiga pequeña Jane as she did her radio show, I bugged Jane to play "Wouldn't You Like It." Bugged. Begged. Pestered. Pleaded. No, Carl!, she insisted, I'm not playing the freakin' Bay City Rollers on my show! She finally relented just to shut me up. The song played...and, to her surprise, she liked it, and said so on the radio. Gotta give her credit for that. She went so far as to say that if the Rollers had just come along a couple of years later than they did, they would have been considered part of the new wave.
That was more than forty years ago. We were pals, and we parted as pals. I still think of Jane whenever I play that song, a Bay City Rollers album track that illustrated the transcendent value of ignoring prejudices, and embodied the enduring strength of friendship. And I dedicate the song once again, as I did on the radio just the other night, to an old comrade. This one goes out to my friend Jane, wherever she is. Thanks again, my friend.
23. THE ROLLING STONES: Get Off Of My Cloud
1965 was pop music's best year ever. I didn't truly start to appreciate the year's bounty until more than a decade later, when I began to discover essential '65 gems by the Kinks, Wilson Pickett, James Brown, Buck Owens, the Yardbirds, the Beau Brummels, the Byrds, the Four Tops, the Temptations, Paul Revere and the Raiders, Fontella Bass, the Small Faces, the Dixie Cups, the Vogues, the Who, the Zombies, the Miracles, the Hollies, George Jones, Stevie Wonder, and so, so many more. Whatta year! The best stuff was popular, and the popular stuff was the best.
Even if I had to wait until teendom to understand the splendor that was all around me when I was five, there was still much I knew as it happened. I certainly knew "Get Off Of My Cloud." I may not have had reason to believe the Rolling Stones were substantively different from contemporary hitmeisters like the Dave Clark Five, Herman's Hermits, the Castaways, or Gary Lewis and the Playboys, but I remember that voice bellowing out of transistor radios: Don't hang around boy, two's a crowd! At five, I thought the twisting of the familiar "Two's company, three's a crowd" maxim was interesting. This record was probably my introduction to the idea of a song having swagger.
22. JOHN LENNON [John & Yoko]: Happy Xmas (War Is Over)
Yeah, we included a Christmas song in a July radio show because a countdown doesn't care about your petty little calendar. John Lennon is TIRnRR's all-time 22nd most-played artist, and "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)" is our most-played Lennon track.
To my ears, this song remains a stirring and engaging plea for peace on Earth, good will toward all. An obvious sentiment? I'm not looking for Proust here. "Happy Xmas" supplies the feels I want in my holiday music, its childlike hope (and children's chorus) never falling prey to the cynical or the overly earnest. I never get tired of hearing it.
Yoko Ono may have saved John Lennon's life. When he met Yoko, John was floundering. His first marriage was doomed; that was mostly (entirely?) John's fault, and neither fame nor acclaim, nor even artistic accomplishment, were helping him find happiness. He found happiness with Yoko. When they split for a while in the '70s, John realized leaving Yoko was a mistake; the separation didn't work out. So, once again, they were together, man. Happy.
John and Yoko's "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)" has always been one of my favorite Christmas records. It acquired a bitter taste of melancholy at the end of 1980, but its sense of hope, its embrace of light, its repudiation of our darker impulses all shine on (like the moon and the stars and the sun, as another Lennon song phrased it). The song makes me sad, but it makes me happy, too. I don't think that song would exist if not for Yoko.
You don't have to be a Yoko fan. You don't even have to like her, I guess, but there's no rational reason why you should dislike her. Maybe I should give some of her music another chance, though I doubt I'll suddenly discover it's, you know, my music. But I like Yoko herself. You should, too. Happy Christmas, John. Happy Christmas, Yoko.
20 [tie]. MARY LOU LORD: Aim Low
December 28th, 1998: the very first episode of This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl. I'd never even heard of Mary Lou Lord, but Dana played "Lights Are Changing" on our debut show, and I was smitten. She played a disastrous Syracuse date in 1999, but we had a chance to meet her and chat for a while. She was a new mom at the time, and my daughter was just shy of four years old, so we spent a bit of time comparing notes; the experience led me to say later on that if someone had told me years ago I'd spend an evening in conversation with a major label recording artist, and that we'd spend most of the time talking about our kids...well, I'd have been skeptical of that claim, I guess.
Mary Lou Lord is one of the defining artists of This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio's long and storied history, and I'm grateful we had that chance to connect. Oh, and her version of Nick Saloman's "Aim Low" is The Greatest Record Ever Made.
10 Songs will return on Thursday, July 8th, with the next set of songs from this week's countdown show. That begins with the artist tied with Mary Lou Lord at the # 20 spot.
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