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 # 1340
THE HALF/CUBES: The Ghost At Number One
We gave you an advance listen to this latest single by the Half/Cubes a couple of weeks back. Now: It's OUT! So, y'know, we're playing it again. We play the hits! And ya can't get a bigger hit than # 1, as the Half/Cubes cover Jellyfish and the spirits 'n' specters all come out a-boppin'. NUMBER ONE!
THE BANGS: Getting Out Of Hand
Before they switched to their more familiar moniker, the Bangles originally called themselves the Bangs, We're guessing the earlier name was switched at Ellis Island. Lousy bureaucrats. As noted in the commentary accompanying this week's playlist, we recently had the very great pleasure of witnessing a fantastic live performance by Vicki Peterson and John Cowsill, she of the Bangles and he of the Cowsills. We play the Bangles and the Cowsills quite a bit in our sovereign airspace, and we're going to be playing even more on our June 21st show, when Vicki Peterson and John Cowsill will be our Featured Performers. Along with your Bangles, your Cowsills, and your tracks from Vicki and John's exquisite 2025 album Long After The Fire, you can expect to hear the Continental Drifters, the Psycho Sisters, Susan Cowsill, Tommy Tune, and more, all perched within the framework of whatever else we decide to play.
Will we be getting out of hand? Remains to be determined, I guess. But be assured: Bangles by any name would sound as sweet.
THE SPONGETONES: (I Really) Need To Kiss You
It's the second week in a row for TIRnRR airplay of the Spongetones' new single "(I Really) Need To Kiss You." Please see above Half/Cubes-related statement that we play the hits. We do! A theme show this coming Sunday night means we're giving 3/4 of the Spongetones the weekend off, but we'll be retaining the services of 'Tones bassist Steve Stoeckel, whose other combo Pop Co-Op just so happen to fit the theme perfectly. Fear not! The Spongetones will return soon.
HOLLY AND THE ITALIANS: Just For Tonight
This luscious pure pop confection comes to us from the 1981 classic The Right To Be Italian, which was the only full-length album released by the great NYC combo Holly and the Italians. A 1982 follow-up called Holly And The Italians was a Holly Beth Vincent solo album (and billed as such). The Right To Be Italian is one of my all-time favorite albums.
Some years back, the above-mentioned Spongetone Steve Stoeckel recommended I consider writing a series of blog pieces on behalf of individual albums I considered perfect. I took that advice, dubbed it Love At First Spin!, and wrote lengthy appreciations of the Barracudas' Drop Out With The Barracudas, the Byrds' Mr. Tambourine Man, and the Ramones' Rocket To Russia, but never completed any further entries in the series.
If I'd continued Love At First Spin, I probably would have gotten around to extolling the virtues of The Right To Be Italian. I have notes from what would have been that piece's opening paragraphs:
"Even our pop obsessions can be reined in by the limits of our budget. In 1981 I was a recent college graduate, flipping burgers under the Golden Arches to fund little things like rent and food. And beer. Oh, and a college loan, minuscule as it was. I certainly didn't bother with frivolous things like savings, or health insurance.
"So what little remained of my weekly McDollars went to entertainment. Pop obsessions. Movies, books, magazines, comic books, the occasional bar-band rock 'n' roll show. But my biggest pop obsession was buying and listening to records.
"Duh.
"Still, whether new or used, there were only so many records I could afford to buy at any given time. Some pop obsessions had to be deferred.
"Where did I first hear of Holly and the Italians? I think the initial HEADS UP!! came to me via another pop obsession: CREEM magazine. I don't recall which of CREEM's supercool scribes reviewed the lone Holly and the Italians LP The Right To Be Italian, but I remember how he described the sound:
"Like Lesley Gore or the Angels backed by Leave Home-era Ramones...."
DAVID MYRH: Summer Summer Summer
As we dive into the summer season, David Myrh's new single "Summer Summer Summer" offers an absolutely ace celebration for the beach-bound convertible cruise of your bikini-clad dreams. School's out. Sun's up. SURF'S UP, too!
MIKE BROWNING: It's Festival Time
The summer's here, and the time is right. Mike Browning knows.
IRENE PEÑA: It Must Be Summer
America's Sweetheart Irene Peña's 2011 album Nothing To Do With You is one of 21st century rockin' pop music's most underrecognized works. The album has never been given a physical release, and I first heard about it waaaaay after the fact, when the good folks at Big Stir Records offered a tenth-anniversary digital-download reissue. Nothing To Do With You retroactively became one of my favorite albums of the 2010s. It's a record that warrants wider appreciation, and it is long overdue for a CD release, perhaps in an expanded edition that includes even more from Irene Peña's catalogue o' wonder. HEY! RECORD LABELS! Yeah, YOU guys. GET ON THIS AWREADY!! And I'm first in line to write some liner notes.
I've been thinking about all of the above for a little while. This week, Dana's spin of Irene's impeccable non-album cover of the Fountains Of Wayne gem "It Must Be Summer" brought the thoughts up front. America's Sweetheart. Let's hear it all.
SLY AND THE FAMILY STONE: Hot Fun In The Summertime
From a previous edition of 10 Songs:
I have previously written that Sly and the Family Stone's "Hot Fun In The Summertime" is "as inviting and idyllic as any June-July-August embrace ever committed to wax, a comforting groove that shines in the daytime and sways with the shadows of twilight." I later added, "If memory serves, a poll of Trouser Press magazine readers in the early '80s named 'Hot Fun In The Summertime' as the # 1 choice for the title of all-time top summer song. Surpassing the Beach Boys in that category would seem a daunting task. But if anyone could do it, it would have to be Sly."
It would probably be a stretch to suggest that Sly Stone wrote "Hot Fun In The Summertime" under the influence of Brian Wilson. I don't quite believe any of Sly and the Family Stone's brilliant work was shaped by Wilson's pet sounds of the soul, at least not willfully. But it would also be a stretch to insist that Wilson wasn't a possible influence; Sly Stone was aware of everything going on in pop music in the '60s, and--to paraphrase something famously uttered by someone else in the Wilson family--Sly Stone was a genius, too. "Hot Fun In The Summertime" doesn't sound like the Beach Boys. Doesn't matter. Sly and Brian sound great in the same radio show. Hot fun, fun, fun in the summertime.
THE MONKEES: Birth Of An Accidental Hipster
The Greatest Record Ever Made!
THE RAMONES: I Don't Care
Effective this week, I have now written and published three books, two of them non-fiction, one of them a collection of professional lies (aka fiction). Each of the three books has included at least some element celebrating the Ramones; my first book was 2023's Gabba Gabba Hey! A Conversation With The Ramones, my 2024 book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) contains chapters about two Ramones tracks (plus one about Amy Rigby's "Dancing With Joey Ramone"), and the Ramones are a recurring reference point within my brand-new fiction project Guitars Vs. Rayguns!! Short Stories And Other White Lies. The spiffy Joey Ramone portrait seen above also appears in Guitars Vs. Rayguns!! The Ramones. It's safe to say I'm a big, big fan. The title of this week's Ramones track notwithstanding, it's plain to see that I do care.
Tomorrow night, June 14th, we're devoting the entirety of the next TIRnRR to music by some of the real-life musical acts mentioned in Guitars Vs. Rayguns!! Chuck Berry! The Cynz! Slade! Wonderboy! The Grip Weeds! Aretha Franklin! Dusty Springfield! The Flashcubes! The Kinks! King Elvis the First! And lots, lots more, including the Ramones. Wouldn't be one of my books if it didn't reference the Ramones. This IS rock 'n' roll radio. Stay tuned for more rock 'n' roll.
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My new book of short stories Guitars Vs. Rayguns!! Short Stories And Other White Lies is out now, and you can get autographed copies of the new book and my previous book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) directly from me. You can still get my previous previous book Gabba Gabba Hey! A Conversation With The Ramones from publisher Rare Bird Books, OR an autographed copy here. If you like the books, please consider leaving a rating and/or review at the usual online resources.
I compiled a various-artists tribute album called Make Something Happen! A Tribute To The Flashcubes, and it's pretty damned good; you can read about it here and order it here.
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, streaming at SPARK stream and on the Radio Garden app as WESTCOTT RADIO. You can read about our history h
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