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 # 1090.
THE SPONGETONES: Oh Yeah!
Both Dana and I wished very much that we could have been in Charlotte, North Carolina this past Saturday for the Spongetones' 40th anniversary concert. The celebration was originally planned for last year, postponed by you know what, rescheduled, and finally performed before a fab audience cashing in the implicit promise of a splendid time guaranteed for all. Neither Dana nor I has ever had an opportunity to see the Spongetones, and this sure woulda been a great show to rectify that.
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| Photo by Laura Lynn |
There was, alas, no friggin' way. We content ourselves with playing the Spongetones on the radio, congratulating the band for their continued excellence and their fans for obvious great taste. Oh yeah? Oh yeah.
THE COOLIES: Yeah I Don't Know
The Coolies were a supercool summit meeting of Palmyra Delran, Melanie Vammen, and the much-missed Kim Shattuck, producing the uberswell six-song EP Uh Oh! It's...The Coolies in 2019. The EP was released prior to Shattuck's death later that same year, and its profits go toward the never-ending battle against ALS, the disease that took Shattuck away from us. From the EP, Shattuck's "Yeah I Don't Know" is unequal parts fatalism and resilience, moody and brooding, yet somehow effervescent at the same time.
HAYLEY AND THE CRUSHERS: Jacaranda
An ongoing illustration of TIRnRR's symbiotic benevolence is that sometimes either Dana or I will obsess with playing a specific song, and then the other one of us starts playing it, too. It's happened many, many times over the course of--gulp--1090 shows and counting; I credit Dana with getting me hooked on Mannix, Anny Celsi, the Stallions, Mary Lou Lord, and many more. This week's playlist includes two examples of Dana running with a song that I'd been playing a lot. "Jacaranda" by Hayley and the Crushers is one of the two, and it remains a righteous blast of YEAH! on the radio, regardless of which one of us put it there.
ETTA JAMES: Something's Got A Hold On Me
Serendipity. On Saturday night, I watched a wonderful 2021 movie called CODA, its title an acronym for Children Of Deaf Adults. The film's opening scene depicts its 17-year-old protagonist Ruby (played by actress Emilia Jones) singing along with Etta James' "Something's Got A Hold On Me" while working with her deaf father and deaf brother aboard their fishing boat. In pre-pandemic programming days, the scene probably would have inspired me to include that song in the TIRnRR playlist the next night.
But these are not pre-pandemic programming days, and the playlist for this week's show was set, and the show itself recorded, several days before I had any notion of seeing this CODA movie. Coincidence. Serendipity. And that good fortune gives me an excuse to recommend the film CODA in no uncertain terms.
LIBRARIANS WITH HICKEYS: I Can't Stop Thinking About You
Catchy as hell. Librarians With Hickeys are no strangers to the TIRnRR playlist; "That Time Is Now," Librarians With Hickeys' collaboration with Lisa Mychols, was among our 58 most-played tracks in 2020, and we can be described accurately as Librarians With Hickeys fans. Their new Big Stir Records single "I Can't Stop Thinking About You" serves to reinforce the reason for our prevailing devotion.
KID GULLIVER: Forget About Him
Oh yeah, I obsessed over this song, for sure. We started playing Kid Gulliver's sublime "Forget About Him" last year, and it's not much of an exaggeration to say it's now an all-time TIRnRR Fave Rave. We play the hits. I play this, Dana played it this week, and the airwaves are brighter because of it. If--IF--we ever do another TIRnRR compilation CD, this one's gotta be on it.
MELANIE WITH THE EDWIN HAWKINS SINGERS: Lay Down (Candles In The Rain)
The Greatest Record Ever Made! We've played the single edit a few times already this year, but I wanted to play the full-length album version once, in all its over-seven-minutes-long glory. We counted it as two songs. We regret nothing.
THE RAVES: Every Little Bit Hurts
The Raves' irresistible 1984 gem "Every Little Bit Hurts" was an early favorite on TIRnRR, scoring some gorgeous whole-friggin'-planet airplay from 1999 on. A Georgia-based band immersed in '60s British Invasion and '70s-'80s new wave and power pop, the Raves were among the many great acts from that post-punk pop era toiling in undeserved obscurity. I didn't hear of them until the '90s, when rumblings in one of the power pop zines (probably Yellow Pills, possibly Audities) prompted me to buy their anthology CD Past Perfect Tense from the mighty Bruce Brodeen's Not Lame catalog. Recently, we've been corresponding with the Raves' Chuck Yoakum, discussing the possibility of mixing some of his more recent work into future playlists. Stay tuned.RICHARD TURGEON: Goodbye To Summer
Richard Turgeon has proven to be a reliable resource for radio-ready pop ditties, both original songs and well-chosen covers. "Goodbye To Summer," from Turgeon's new Kool Kat Musik release Campfire Songs, makes us mourn the passing of the season right now, when there's still a few weeks left before Labor Day, fercryinoutloud. Damn this effect pop music has on us!
JAMES BROWN: Papa's Got A Brand New Bag
With The Tenth Annual DANA'S FUNKY SOUL PIT all set to make ya sweat this coming Sunday August 22nd, we wanted to make sure we offered a li'l teasing taste of that in this week's tag. The logical choice was something by the Godfather of Soul, so we played the enduring classic "Papa's Got A Brand New Bag" right after we said that's it, adios, we're done, goodnight and we'll see you next week, This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl, WAITWAITWAITWAITWAIT!, we got one more. Our new bag commenced thereafter.
To prep for the Soul Pit, here's a reprise of something I wrote last year about "Papa's Got A Brand New Bag:"
"1965: pop music's best year ever. If 'Papa's Got A Brand New Bag' wasn't my first James Brown song, it was the first one I noticed. I may or may not have heard it during its reign on the charts; I was only five, but believe me, even five-year-olds knew the irresistible sounds of the radio, the jukeboxes, and neighborhood teenagers blastin' their 45s in 1965. It's possible I didn't actively recognize it until it became an oldie in the '70s, played back on a nostalgic weekend AM radio shindig or in a TV commercial hawking the great old hits by the original artists.
"I didn't become a fan until much later. I don't remember hearing Brown's anthem 'Say It Loud--I'm Black And I'm Proud' on the radio in 1968, but I do recall seeing it mentioned in an issue of the Superman's Girlfriend Lois Lane comic book. Believe it or not. And I remember being mesmerized by Brown's live performance in 1964's The T.A.M.I. Show when I caught that flick on cable in the mid '70s. A bit later, during the 1980 Democratic National Convention, my girlfriend Brenda and I were having dinner with our friends Les Odom and Yvette Nixon, splitting our time between watching a firebrand speech by Senator Ted Kennedy and listening to James Brown's Live At The Apollo LP. (You may have heard of Les and Yvette's son, actor Leslie Odom Jr. Brenda and I are looking forward to finally seeing the younger Leslie as Aaron Burr in Hamilton, courtesy of Disney+.) [2021 note: Hamilton was extraordinary!]
"My own first James Brown records were weathered 45s of 'Cold Sweat,' 'Don't Be A Drop-Out,' and 'Say It Loud--I'm Black And I'm Proud,' salvaged in the early '80s at a church basement rummage sale underneath the Buffalo day care center where Brenda worked. And all of it--1965, Lois Lane, The T.A.M.I. Show, Les and Yvette and Ted Kennedy, my rummage sale 45 haul, all of it--came together in my head when Cal Zone, a great DJ at Buffalo State College's incomparable WBNY-FM, included 'Papa's Got A Brand New Bag' among his '60s garage and trash thrash delights one night at a Buffalo nightclub. Connection. CC's got a brand new bag."
That connection continues next week. Please join us for The Tenth Annual DANA'S FUNKY SOUL PIT.
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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
I'm on Twitter @CafarelliCarl.
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