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.
This week's edition of 10 Songs draws exclusively from the playlist for This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio # 1087.
THE ANDERSON COUNCIL: I'd Love Just Once To See You
The fabulous 2021 tribute album Jem Records Celebrates Brian Wilson has already fed the ravenous needs of the TIRnRR playlist with sweet treats from the Grip Weeds and Lisa Mychols and Super 8, and this week's edition adds the Anderson Council to that sun-kissed roll call. The Anderson Council turn in a lovely reading of the Beach Boys' cheeky "I'd Love Just Once To See You," which we took the liberty of dedicating to Miss February.
Wherever she is.THE BEATLES: Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds
"Picture yourself in a boat on a river with tangerine trees and marmalade skies?"
Hmph. A boy band tries to go all progressive on us.
NO! I KID! I'm a kidder. I'm on record (again and again) stating my absolute adoration of the music the Beatles released before Sgt. Pepper taught the band to play, but I'm also on record praising Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and the White Album. When it comes to the Beatles, I'm just a guy who can say yeah-yeah-yeah.
Always loved "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds." In high school and college, late '70s, most of my peers preferred Elton John's then-recent cover of "Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds" to the peerless original; I did like how ol' Reg did the song (especially with its participation from John Lennon hisself), but I never thought it within light years of the exquisite version rendered by the act I've known for all these years.
(And this week's playlist was set, the show recorded, before I saw Paul McCartney discussing "Lucy In The Sky With iamonds" with Rick Rubin on the third episode of the Hulu show McCartney 3, 2, 1. The act we've known for all these years? There's still so much more left for us to discover. Cue the girl with kaleidoscope eyes. As always: yeah yeah yeah!)
MIKE BROWNING: Picture Book
We played Mike Browning's able take on the Kinks' "Picture Book" a few weeks back. It returns to the playlist now, just in time for the announcement of Mike's upcoming album Class Act. Class Act collects a number of recordings our lad Mike did for Jamie Hoover's recording and production class, including covers of familiar faves by the Monkees, Tommy Tutone, the Spencer Davis Group, XTC, Bashful Bod Dylan (via the Byrds), the Strangeloves, the Springfields, and the Reflections, plus the surfer dudes and British boy band mentioned in the two 10 Songs entries above. And THE KINKS! We've only heard the Kinks cover so far, but that's enough to make us wanna hear more. Classy!
FANNY: Hey Bulldog
I have a lingering feeling that I had at least some sort of peripheral awareness of the all-female '70s rock group Fanny some time prior to my first conscious exposure to their music. Maybe? I remember seeing them on American Bandstand in August of 1974, lip-syncing their covers of the Bell Notes' "I've Had it" and the Rolling Stones' "Let's Spend The Night Together." Both tracks were from the group's '74 LP Rock And Roll Survivors, their fifth album, their last album, and their only album for Casablanca Records. The group's founder, guitarist June Millington, left the band before Rock And Roll Survivors, and one could argue that it wasn't really Fanny after June's departure.
The AB appearance was my introduction to Fanny--I'm pretty sure I never heard them on the radio before (or after) that--and it may have been the first I heard of them, too. But...I dunno. I have this nagging pinprick at the edge of my consciousness, insisting that I'd read about Fanny in a magazine or seen a print ad for one of their albums (or even seen one of their albums on the racks at Gerber Music) before seeing their cathode-ray image talking with Dick Clark. Nagging pinpricks can't be trusted, mind you, but they should be acknowledged. Sometimes they're even right.
Fanny's cover of the Beatles' "Hey Bulldog" comes from 1972's Fanny Hill, Fanny's third album. For further Beatleproofing, the album was recorded at Apple, and engineered by Geoff Emerick. And I wish I'd heard all of this a lot earlier in my timeline.
THE FLASHCUBES WITH MIMI BETINIS: Baby It's Cold Outside
Radio's job is to sell records. Let's get to work! "Baby It's Cold Outside," the new single from the Flashcubes with Mimi Betinis, is out this Friday from the visionary pop people at Big Stir Records. But it's available as a preorder RIGHT NOW. So--how to put this delicately?--BUY IT AWREADY!!!! Do what your radio tells you to do. That's your job!
JOHNNY JOHNSON AND THE BANDWAGON: Mr. Tambourine Man
Ignoring Golden Throats crap like William Shatner's phasers-on-blechh reading from the Book of Zimmerman, one of the most unusual but still agreeable Dylan covers has gotta be "Mr. Tambourine Man" by the great Johnny Johnson and the Bandwagon. The song is almost unrecognizable, but fascinating in its willful determination to cast its dancing spell its way. It's not folk, it's not folk rock, and it eschews the easy notion of jingling or jangling in favor of an AM radio groove that can only be called bubblesoul. The Bandwagon never breached the Billboard Hot 100, but "Breakin' Down The Walls Of Heartache" and "Blame It (On The Pony Express)" deserved much wider acclaim, and the same could be said of their "Mr. Tambourine Man." Dylan goes eclectic!
GLADYS KNIGHT AND THE PIPS: I Heard It Through The Grapevine
Until fairly recently--say, within the last several years--I never cared for Gladys Knight and the Pips' version of "I Heard It Through The Grapevine." I must have had rocks in my head, and/or stale cotton candy stuffed in my ears. I didn't especially care for Creedence Clearwater Revival's cover, but I preferred it to Gladys and her Pips' rendition at the time. I always adored Marvin Gaye's definitive take on the song--neither rocks nor cotton candy could diminish me to quite that extent--but as I developed a belated appreciation of Motown in the late '70s and early '80s, my tone-deaf audio receptors thought the Pips' version sounded--wait for it!--too show biz, too Vegas.
Rocks. Cotton candy. Musta been somethin' in there, occupying all that nothing.
And it took me way too long to see the error of my ways, to knock the stupid outta my noggin and let Gladys and company testify with righteous fervor about the ugly ramifications of word-of-mouth revelations. It certainly wasn't a case of me not recognizing the talent in play here--I've loved "Midnight Train To Georgia" for nearly five decades now--but I guess I couldn't sufficiently loosen my embrace of Marvin Gaye's definitive version to allow myself the pure pleasure of Gladys Knight and the Pips' own stirring chronicle of a loose and faithless lover exposed by loose and chatty lips. Vegas...?! I should eat the rocks and throw the cotton candy in Charlie Brown's trick-or-treat sack.
I know better now. And I knew it before watching Summer Of Soul, where Glady Knight and the Pips' mesmerizing live performance of "I Heard It Through The Grapevine" is an absolute highlight in a film loaded with highlights. I betcha wonder how I knew. Glorious. I shoulda listened earlier.
PAGLIARO: Some Sing Some Dance
Like the Equals' "I Can See, But You Don't Know" (which also graced this week's playlist), Pagliaro's "Some Sing Some Dance" was cited in Bomp! magazine's 1978 power pop manifesto as one of the defining examples of the style. Much later, Ray Paul and Emitt Rhodes teamed for a lovely cover of the song, but I don't think it's all that well-known among power pop fans even now. Nonetheless: power pop. Bomp! said so.
SORROWS: Play This Song (On The Radio)
An easy direction to follow, and we were happy to comply. From Sorrows' minty-fresh album Love Too Late--The Real Album, courtesy of Big Stir Records.
DIAN ZAIN/THE MOST: Take A Chance
Rest in peace, Dian Zain.
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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 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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