10 Songs is a weekly list of ten songs that happen to be on my mind at the moment. The lists are usually dominated by songs played on the previous Sunday 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 # 1142.
Though hailing from down under, the Seekers were based in the UK at the time of their pop chart ascension, and were generally considered part of the British Invasion. Both Dana and I wanted to play our own favorite Seekers tune in Durham's honor; Dana chose the iconic Swingin' '60s soundtrack song "Georgy Girl" in the first set (immediately following my opening spin of Olivia Newton-John's "If Not For You"), and I saved the Seekers' unforgettable "I'll Never Find Another You" to play in our closing set. We'll never find another. Rest in peace, Judith.
HELIUM ANGEL: Georgie
The British Invasion remains a huge influence on everything (and whatever it is) we do on TIRnRR. The influence manifests in more than just continued airplay for the Beatles, the Kinks, the Dave Clark Five, and Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich, and shapes so much more of our ongoing identity. Acts that influenced the Beatles? Check! American reaction to the invading Brits? Check! Connections from Merseybeat, Muswell Hill, and the Tottenham Sound to punk and power pop? Check! Songs that reference (a little bit) the Seekers' salute to a girl walking down the street so fancy-free? My Fab ladies and gentlemen, please check out "Georgie" by San Francisco group Helium Angel.
"Georgie" is a a track from Helium Angel's 1998 album An Early Clue To The New Direction, an album title that wears its Heart Day's Night on its proverbial sleeve. The song was an early and irresistible Fave Rave on our show. This week, given the track's direct lyrical references to the Seekers' biggest hit, Dana felt (rightly so) that Helium Angel's "Georgie" was the only viable choice to follow "Georgy Girl." Always window shopping, but never stopping to buy. Wake up, Helium Angel; it's time for jumping off of the shelf.
THE RAMONES: California Sun
It is possible that the Ramones' 1977 cover of the Rivieras' "California Sun" was the very first Ramones record I ever heard. If that's true, though, I didn't realize it (or, I guess, actually hear it) at the time.
My freshman year at college in Brockport, NY commenced with the Fall '77 semester. Reading Phonograph Record Magazine when I was in high school, and hearing the Sex Pistols, Nick Lowe, and Graham Parker on commercial FM radio, had primed me to become a nascent fan of punk/new wave/what-have-you, and made me eager to hear more. Most especially, I wanted to hear the Ramones.
"Blitzkrieg Bop" was the first Ramones track to register in my ears, thanks to airplay on the campus radio station WBSU-AM. In November, "Sheena Is A Punk Rocker" became the record that changed my life. It wouldn't be all that long before I began thinking of the Ramones as the American Beatles, the greatest American rock 'n' roll band of all time. "Sheena" set me on the path of wanting to write about rock 'n' roll music, eventually leading me to write a book about the Ramones. Like my pal Rich Firestone says about the beneficial effect the Monkees have had upon his life, the Ramones have been good to me.
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| This is NOT the Ramones book I wrote. Would that it were. Todd Alcott is a genius. |
But, before "Blitzkrieg" and "Sheena," before writing essays and magazine articles and books about Joey, Johnny, Dee Dee, Tommy, Marky, Richie, and C.J., before any of that: "California Sun?"
Yeah. It's possible. My uncontrollable urge to hear the sounds I'd read about in PRM drove me to make phone call after phone call after phone call to WBSU, requesting chances to hear Blondie, Television, the Dictators, and others, all alongside my other requests for DC5, Monkees, Paul Revere and the Raiders, et al. British Invasion, American reaction, and punk. At the top of my list of requests: I wanted to hear the Ramones.
That opportunity was deferred, whether by design or circumstance. My earliest Ramones requests were met with situations where either the DJ didn't have any Ramones records on hand, or (maybe more likely) wasn't gonna play the razzafrazzin' Ramones, no way, no how. Some DJs were sympathetic to my interests. Some were not.
I think it was one of the sympathetic jocks who answered my Ramones request by saying, "I just played 'California Sun' in the last set."
Really? Yeah, it's possible. I may have even heard it play. But even if he did play it, and even if I did hear it, it didn't register in my mind, and it certainly didn't register as THE RAMONES! The revelation was therefore deferred.
But revelation came in its time. 1-2-3-4! The chant of Hey Ho, Let's Go! eventually blasted out of my AM radio, courtesy of WBSU. A 45 of "Sheena Is A Punk Rocker" was waiting for me at the local record store, and...yes. YES!! Even Yeah Yeah Yeah! We love you Ramones, oh yes we do.
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.
I'm on Twitter @CafarelliCarl
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