10 SONGS: 2/15/2025

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 # 1272: THIS IS ROCK 'N' ROLL RADIO celebrates BLACK HISTORY MONTH.

ARTHUR CONLEY: Sweet Soul Music

As a confederacy of dunces seek to disavow the long-held tradition of recognizing February as Black History Month, I hereby declare this and every month from now on will be National Ridicule The Federal Confederacy Of Dunces Month. This will remain in effect until sanity returns and we consign the odious dunces to go bathing in the Gulf of Mexico.

Meanwhile, This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio celebrates Black History Month right here, and for our opening theme we call on the services of Arthur Conley. Do you like good music? You're in the right place.

BIG MAMA THORNTON: Hound Dog

We open the show proper with a long-distance dedication, going out to a not-so-special someone. No names are necessary. Big Mama Thornton knows who you are...and she knows what you are.

DERRICK ANDERSON: Send Me Down A Sign

I think Derrick Anderson is best known as bassist for the Bangles, but he first entered this little mutant radio show's airspace with TIRnRR Fave Raves the Andersons! Yeah, we were playing the Andersons! from the get-go, and that's an absolutely hilarious in-joke. Trust me! It is!

We've also been big fans of Derrick's 2017 solo album A World Of My Own, and its breakout track "When I Was Your Man" accrued significant Dana & Carl spinnage. This week, we figured we'd dig a little deeper into the album for "Send Me Down A Sign," a track I don't think we've ever played previously. I tell ya, this world of Derrick Anderson's own sounds like a mighty fine place to be.

JOAN ARMATRADING: Eating The Bear

From a previous post:

Some days the bear will eat you. Some days you eat the bear. All due respect to the incredible Ms. Joan Armatrading, but there are days when I believe this even-handed ratio to be overly optimistic regarding our collective and individual odds of surviving wholesale consumption by ravenous ursines. I don't think the Ranger's gonna like this, Yogi. 

"Eating The Bear" was (I think) the first Joan Armatrading track I knew, a cut from her 1981 album Walk Under Ladders. It's not the best-known track on that record; both "I'm Lucky" and "When I Get It Right" wound up on her Greatest Hits collection, while "Eating The Bear" remained native to the original album only. I was exposed to all three of those tracks in the same time frame, so I can't say for sure which one I heard first. But, whichever one was first to cross into my sovereign airspace, "Eating The Bear" was the one that had impact. Its impact came via the radio. Of course.

In 1981, I was a recent college graduate (State University College at Brockport Class of 1980), living in an apartment with my girlfriend (who was still completing her undergrad studies at Brockport), working at McDonald's, drinking beer, listening to my music. Brockport is a small village on the Erie Canal. It's located in Western New York, about 19 miles west of Rochester, and the city of Buffalo sprawls another 64 miles or so farther away. We could usually get radio stations from Buffalo and even from Toronto. Buffalo had a generic album-rock station called 97 Rock, a bland AOR outlet that usually wasn't of much interest to me. Sunday nights were the exception. That's when this cookie-cutter rock station transformed itself temporarily into something greater: A weekly showcase called 97 Power Rock.

97 Power Rock claimed a more adventurous format, programming new wave rock and other fare that was presumably edgier than the station's prerequisite diet of Loverboy and Journey. 97 Power Rock played the likes of The Teardrop Explodes, U2, Psychedelic Furs, Viva Beat, Joy Division, Spandau Ballet, the Vibrators, Mission of Burma, old school rock by Andy Fairweather Low, even reggae by Dillinger. It was sufficiently eclectic and vibrant to secure my loyalty.

Joan Armatrading's music was part of that. Walk Under Ladders had a little bit of a post-punk vibe, partially attributable to Steve Lillywhite's production plus Thomas Dolby's synthesizer work on the album. That perceived level of cool opened 97 Power Rock's playlist for entry, and Armatrading's own songs, singing, playing, and pure presence did the rest. Man, this sounded fantastic on the radio. It didn't quite move me to buy the album--I was still a few years away from grasping Armatrading's brilliance--but it got my attention. I heard the songs, and a radio ad for the album, all of which prompted me to scrawl Walk Under Ladders in my spiral notebook, on the long, long list of LPs I wanted to buy once I'd accumulated enough burger-flippin' cash to buy all of the albums I wanted.

"Eating The Bear" was the Armatrading track for me. In 1981, I'd never heard the phrase Some days you eat the bear, some days the bear eats you, so I had no idea whatsoever of the song's subject matter, no proper understanding of its stubborn fatalism, its determined swig from a half-empty glass that we'll refill if we survive, and smash in the face of any critter that says we won't. I just thought it sounded great, and it still sounds great. 

For years, Armatrading's Greatest Hits was her sole representation in my music collection, and "Me Myself I" is discussed in my book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1). "Eating The Bear" subsequently popped into my head again, and I snagged a CD of Walk Under Ladders, a wonderful album that I wish had made the transition from my notebook list to my record shelf forty-odd years ago. 

Better late than never. Sometimes it takes a while, but radio gets the job done eventually. Bear necessities. Mind your manners there, Yogi. I ain't a-gonna be in no pic-a-nic basket. I'll keep you off my menu if you keep me off yours.

THE CHAMBERS BROTHERS: Time Has Come Today

The Greatest Record Ever Made!

RIHANNA: Shut Up And Drive

I remember hearing Rihanna's hit "Umbrella" in 2007, and not being especially taken with it. In 2008, the updated version of her Good Girl Gone Bad (Good Girl Gone Bad: Reloaded) landed into my consciousness via my then-teen daughter, whose interest in "Take A Bow" and "Disturbia" brought those songs to my attention as well. I was a little surprised to discover I liked them (especially "Disturbia"), but I did indeed like them.

I missed out on the track "Shut Up And Drive." I've heard it, but I never noticed it until a random search for playlist ideas brought me to it earlier this month. It was like a brand new song to me, and I loved it.

(How did I know I loved it? The fact that I played it on obsessive repeat would be a pretty clear clue to that.)

Wikipedia describes "Shut Up And Drive" as a new wave song--no, really!--based on "Blue Monday" by New Order. No offense to the mopey British guys, but I prefer it the way Rihanna did it.

RAY CHARLES: Hit The Road Jack

Yep. I direct this sentiment at the precise dunces to whom you would think I'd direct it.

GRANDMASTER AND MELLE MEL: White Lines (Don't Don't Do It)

From my book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1):

"...New Music Radio [WBNY-FM in Buffalo, a station to which I was religiously devoted in the '80s]  included hip hop. Like Herman's Hermits, rap was part of the atmosphere, part of the flavor of WBNY. WBNY was my introduction to Run DMC (with 'Rockbox'), and it was my introduction to Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five. 'The Message.' Don't push me 'cause I'm close to the edge. Music journalists told us 'The Message' was the first big hip-hop track to ignore party-time bragging to focus instead on social commentary, to chronicle inner-city living in disadvantaged black neighborhoods. It's like a jungle sometimes, it makes me wonder how I keep from goin' under. We didn't need to be told how powerful it sounded on the radio.

"The importance and impact of 'The Message' notwithstanding, 'White Lines (Don't Don't Do It)' meant more to me, then and now. It's more pop than 'The Message,' with its seductive rang-dang-diggety-dang-de-dang melody, propulsive bass, and Melle Mel's cry of 'BASS!,' the latter sucker-punching you when you realize it's meant as a deceptive homophone for 'base,' as in freebase cocaine...

"...'White Lines (Don't Don't Do It)' is a Melle Mel record; former cohorts Grandmaster Flash and Melle Mel had parted company prior to 'White Lines,' but the record was credited to Grandmaster and Melle Mel in an attempt to capitalize on the familiar name and the previous success of 'The Message.' It is often referred to as a Grandmaster Flash record, and that's what I thought it was when I heard it on WBNY. Whatever and whomever, I couldn't hear it enough...."

CEELO GREEN: Forget You

Maybe not the first specific "F YOU!" that comes to mind in these troubling times. Though, come to think of it, it wasn't the first "F YOU!" that came to CeeLo Green's mind either. One of the marks of how great this is as a pure pop song is that the original "Fuck You" is incidental; it works just as well in FCC-friendly format. "Forget You" is perfectly radio-ready without the potty mouth, and perfectly pissed-off in any incarnation.

JAMES BROWN: Say It Loud--I'm Black And I'm Proud [Pt. 1]

There is much reason for pride. We celebrate it throughout the year. And we circle it on our calendar every February for Black History Month. Say it loud.

If you like what you see here on Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do), please consider a visit to CC's Tip Jar. 

My new book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) is now available, and you can order an autographed copy here. You can still get my 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.

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. Recent shows are archived at Westcott Radio. You can read about our history here.

10 SONGS: 7/3/2024 [THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE!, Part 1]

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 will really be 40 Songs, presented in four parts. The selections draw from the playlist for This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio # 1240, presenting a few of the tracks featured in my new book THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (VOLUME 1).

We played 48 tracks on this week's show; for ten of those, I read on-air excerpts from the book's chapter about that track. This four-part collection of 10 Songs columns will offer snippets on behalf of the other 38 tracks, with two bonus tracks at the end.

BADFINGER: Baby Blue

..."Baby Blue" is the embodiment of why I fell in love with the radio in the first place. It’s an enduring testimony to why I still love radio's potential, in spite of all efforts to make me give up on that love. Radio gave me Badfinger. I can never repay that debt....

CHUCK BERRY: Promised Land

...Chuck Berry knew well the travails of the downtrodden. Dark skin, humble origin, and destined to transcend everything to become one of the most significant performers 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 seething behind his flamboyant mask. A nice man? Possibly not, but beside the point. An important man? If you've ever loved rock 'n' roll, you should be ashamed to even ask that question...

...Into this tinderbox, Chuck Berry brought an electric match: Black music that made white kids dance. He wrote in code—most famously, the irresistibly potent brown-skinned handsome man who became (wink) a brown-eyed handsome man—but he crafted and chronicled the American teen-age dream with greater eloquence than anyone else, black or white....

DUSTY SPRINGFIELD: I Only Want To Be With You

...Writer Greg Shaw noted that Dusty Springfield's "I Only Want to Be With You" explodes with as much pure pop noise as any Dave Clark Five record. The horns propel, the strings soar, the girl-group spirit celebrates, the music leans forward. Miss Dusty Springfield presides over all of it, dancing by herself at the microphone, singing sweetly of her love, her happiness, her contented fulfillment in the arms of her chosen one. Her only wish, only ambition, is to be with the object of her desire. We hope it can really be as simple as that....

ELVIS PRESLEY: Heartbreak Hotel

The entire world was about to change in an instant. No one knew what was about to happen. If they say they did, they're lyin'.

Unless, maybe, "they" happened to be Sam Phillips....

BIG MAMA THORNTON: Hound Dog

...Where and when did rock 'n' roll start? There are a few key artifacts to consider in seeking to ID the first rock 'n' roll record. "Rocket ‘88’" by Jackie Brentson and his Delta Cats (1951, and really Ike Turner and his Kings of Rhythm) is the closest we have to a consensus choice. Some would point to "The Fat Man" by Fats Domino (1950). I would at least add Amos Milburn's "Down the Road Apiece" (1947) to the discussion, and no less an authority than Lenny and Squiggy (on TV's Laverne and Shirley) spoke on behalf of "Call the Police," a 1941 single Nat King Cole made with the King Cole Trio. There are other progenitors and trailblazers from across the heady mingling of jump blues, R & B, country, and swing that birthed this bastard child we call rock 'n' roll. What was the daddy of them all? Not even a blood test is going to make that determination.

"Hound Dog" is not the first rock 'n' roll record. But its original release does predate the Rock 'n' Roll Era. It was written by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller specifically for rhythm and blues singer Big Mama Thornton. Thornton's "Hound Dog" single topped the R & B chart in 1953. Fittingly, her performance of the song is as much a growl as it is anything else, a snarling dismissal of a worthless cur who can wag his tail, but she ain't gonna feed him no more...

PATTI SMITH: Gloria

Jesus died for somebody's sins but not mine.

That may be the greatest opening line in rock 'n' roll's long and thumping history. It's iconoclastic. It's rebellious. It swaggers, it shrugs, and it seethes with the promise of desire, the pursuit of quick-fix happiness. It's a precise moment of rules breaking beyond meaningful repair. It's a confession. It's a sacrament. It's sacrilege. And it's all in service of a freakin' cover song.

Patti Smith's "Gloria" is a medley, grafting her own rant "In Excelsis Deo" onto Van Morrison's surly juggernaut "Gloria." Morrison's group Them recorded the original “Gloria” as a British B-side (to "Baby, Please Don't Go") in 1964. In the US, radio programmers objected to the lines And she comes to my room/Yeah, she makes me feel all right, deeming the song too salacious for airplay. A 1966 cover by the Shadows of Knight excised the offending line and hit the Top 10. And American youth was safe.

One wonders what 1960s moralists would have said about Patti Smith's "Gloria" if they could have heard it a decade before it even existed.

Probably nothing. Hearing it would have struck them mute....

LITTLE RICHARD: The Girl Can't Help It

Stranded in this conformist world of the 1950s, Little Richard was the Georgia Peach, a wild and effeminate black man, flamboyant, a strange visitor from another planet with powers and abilities far beyond those of mortal men. His performances were electrifying, pounding, an irresistible symphony of WOOOOO! A-wop-bopa-loo-bop-a-lop-bam-boom. In the late fifties, only Jerry Lee Lewis could match the sheer fervor of Little Richard. Little Richard was as bright a star as this dull world had ever seen.

And he was certain that he was going to Hell....

NEIL DIAMOND: Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show

Faith is infectious. Its specifics can vary from believer to believer, even among those who share a covenant. 

Among his vast résumé of well-known pop compositions, Neil Diamond wrote both "I'm A Believer" and "Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show." The former is a love song that casually employs elements of the celestial. The latter evokes Gospel without being Gospel, a not-quite-secular/not-quite-sacred first-person report of a man with a Bible in his hand, a sermon in his heart, and a tent full of believers primed for salvation on a hot August night....

THE RAMONES: Sheena Is A Punk Rocker

Dangerous. Deplorable. Degenerate. The Ramones were supposed to be dirty, filthy punks, likely to slit your throat for spare change, or just for kicks. They were loud. They were sloppy. They were beneath contempt.

And they were one of the greatest pop bands in the world.

That seeming incongruity has never quite resolved itself. In certain circles, one risks immediate scorn for the sin of considering the Ramones a power pop band. But it was never a sin.

It was a revelation....

ARTHUR CONLEY: Sweet Soul Music

...Do you like good music? You've come to the right place. Oh yeah!

TOMORROW: PART 2!

If you like what you see here on Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do), please consider a visit to CC's Tip Jar. 

My new book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) is now available for order; you can see details here. My 2023 book Gabba Gabba Hey! A Conversation With The Ramones is also still available, courtesy of the good folks at Rare Bird Books. 

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. Recent shows are archived at Westcott Radio. You can read about our history here.

I'm on Twitter @CafarelliCarl

10 SONGS: 4/13/2024

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 # 1228. This show is available as a podcast.

DAVE COPE AND THE SASS: One Hell Of A Ride

The music of Dave Cope and the Sass annexed its rightful share of TIRnRR airplay with the group's 2022 album Julee. I was (and remain!) fully in thrall of Julee's title track in particular, an irresistible rockin' pop nugget that earns the technical description razzafrazzin' FANTASTIC!! 

Restraint is for suckers. Embrace the enthusiasm awready.

And NOW! Dave Cope and the Sass return with another fine new release on the mighty Kool Kat Musik label. New album Hidden From The World serves up the prerequisite MORE! that TIRnRR craves. This week's show opens with "One Hell Of A Ride," and we'll hear another Hidden From The World track on this coming Sunday night. Razzafrazzin' fantastic. And one hell of a ride.

MONOGROOVE: I Think Of You

Essential pop act Monogroove includes the talents of the one 'n' only Rin Lennon. Rin should be familiar to the TIRnRR faithful from her work in the '80s as a member of the way-fab combo On The Air. From a previous post:

"On The Air were Rin Lennon (alias Karin), Jennifer Dorfman, and Jamie Garcia, with some other personnel in place of Jamie on some of their previous recordings. I first heard the group via their track 'Even Try,' which appeared on Rhino's (then-) contemporary girl group compilation The Girls Can't Help It in 1984. My pal Andrea Ogarrio put another On The Air gem on a divine mix tape she slapped together for me decades ago, and I snapped up the EP itself when I discovered it in a used record shop in Melbourne, Florida in 1994. SCORE!!

"I think the On The Air EP track Andrea mixed into her cassette creation was a wonderful li'l number called 'You've Got What I Want.' My favorite on the record is "This Can't Be Real," written by 20/20's Mike Gallo, a pop gem that remains a fixture on my iPod. Can't play vinyl in the car, man. 'Even Try' isn't on the EP, and a quick scan of Discogs suggests there were a handful of other On The Air tracks released on a previous single. Enough for an On The Air CD compilation? I say so!"

Well! While there ain't no On The Air CD collection as of now, Bandcamp does have an expanded version of On The Air available to purchase as a download. HuzZAH! Bandcamp is also where you can find Monogroove's current album The Flip Side, as well as some previous Monogroove works. We live in a world of plenty!

And we're plenty interested in playing Monogroove on the radio. We'll start with "I Think Of You," a sprightly pop ditty from The Flip Side, and we'll renew our pursuit of plenty this Sunday, with a Flip Side cover of a '60s classic. Monogroove is on the air.

MIKE BROWNING: Just One Day

They say Buddy Holly lives. Mike Browning has proof.

DEAN LANDEW: Job

Dean Landew's 2018 gem "After Work" very quickly accrued lots of acclaim and airplay on this little mutant radio show, and I consider it one of the many defining tracks of whatever the hell it is we do here. Dean's new single "Job" is very nearly the equal of "After Work," and that's high praise from me. "Job" leans forward in the way rockin' pop oughta, implying a seething inner pissed-offedness while barrelin' head like there's no such thing as a care in the whole freakin' world. Catharsis is best when it's catchy.

BIG MAMA THORNTON: Hound Dog

The Greatest Record Ever Made!

WONDERBOY: Arms Of Regret

STILL not Wonderboy's Robbie Rist

In last week's exciting edition of 10 Songs, we mentioned that three tracks--Elena Rogers' "I Feel Alive," Leather Catsuit's "Can't Get You Off My Mind," and Paul Collins' "I'm The Only One For You"--had already punched their virtual tickets for spots somewhere on TIRnRR's 2024 year-end countdown show. Quick work there, people! We gave all of these one more spin this week, and now each will be taking a little well-earned time off. Instead, we'll hear new singles from Paul and Elena this Sunday, and I betcha Leather Catsuit will also return to the ol' playlist afore very long.

We also mentioned that Wonderboy's epic ode to infatuation "Girl Songs" was THISCLOSE!! to likewise locking up a berth on the countdown. Like, probably already there, and definitely at least a probability if not quite a dead-to-rights certainty.

If we stopped playing it right now.

The season doesn't end today. We're not even half-way through, and regardless of whether or not "Girl Songs" has already guaranteed itself a place on the countdown, c'mon--WE'RE GONNA BE PLAYING IT AGAIN! Probably more than once, and I tell ya, its already-recorded appearance on our very next TIRnRR pretty much seals the deal anyway.

But we did give "Girl Songs" this week off. Instead, we widened TIRnRR's dim widdle spotlight to include another track from Wonderboy's Hero Isle album: "Arms Of Regret."

We regret nothing. As a line from one of my three current secret projects says, "this would be a cautionary tale if its central figure were, y'know...repentant."

Regrets? We have a few. Playing Wonderboy isn't one of them.

THE FLASHCUBES: Gudbuy T' Jane

From the album Pop Masters--my favorite record of 2023--we've played the Flashcubes' cover of Slade's "Gudbuy T' Jane" on several occasions. Prior to this week, its most recent spin was on our March 18th show, which was recorded and aired after Pop Masters won the SAMMY (Syracuse Area Music Awards) for Best Rock Album. "Gudbuy T' Jane" was what played as Flashcubes Paul Armstrong and Gary Frenay strode to the stage to accept the award on behalf of fellow 'Cubes Tommy Allen and Arty Lenin). 

I wanted to acknowledge the moment and the great track that accompanied it, and I did so on the show itself. But that was also the week we paid tribute to the late Eric Carmen, so that week's associated 10 Songs column was devoted entirely to Carmen's legacy.

It's never too late to congratulate. Congratulations as well to our friends Perilous, whose album YEAH!!! was nominated in the same category. We'll hear a track apiece from Pop Masters and YEAH!!! on Sunday night.

RIDEL HIGH: Self Destructive [demo]

Our introductory spin of Ridel High's demo version of "Self Destructive" (from the Big Stir Records/SpyderPop Records book 'n' vinyl LP compilation package Generation Blue) marks the fourth week in a row that a track from Generation Blue has appeared on our playlist. Let's go for FIVE in a row. Hey, teen sensations Ridel High! Stay after school. We're gonna need you here again on Sunday.

THE CYNZ: Just A Boy

We've been all-in on behalf of Little Miss Lost, the current album by TIRnRR Fave Raves the Cynz. Without checking stats, I think "Just A Boy" is the fourth different track we've played off this album, and that's not counting the singles we programmed before they appeared on the album ("Narrow Hips" and a cover of Holly and the Italians' "Tell That Girl To Shut Up"). All in.

"Just A Boy" may be the best of the lot. It gets another spin this Sunday. With apologies to the Shangri-Las: When we say we're all in you best believe we're all in, I-N-Z!

THE B-52'S: There's A Moon In The Sky (Called The Moon)

What else can you play the night before a total solar eclipse? After spins of the Rolling Stones' "Paint It, Black" and the Beatles' "Tomorrow Never Knows," we greeted the darkness of midnight with the B-52's and  "There's A Moon In The Sky (Called The Moon.)"

It was overcast on Monday. I decided to leave work for a bit and head back home so my wife and I could try to watch whatever Totality we could spy, and spy it together.

At the moment of totality, the clouds thinned. Just enough. The air darkened. The street lights came on. And Brenda and I could see the moon completely block the sun. It was a magic moment, and we were able to experience it at each other's side.

As I write these words, I'm dealing with a professional setback. It's depressing and sobering. I'll fight my way back to the light. Maybe not today, but soon. 

In the mean time, I can reflect on the cosmic beauty of that moment on Monday, when Brenda and I looked to the heavens and witnessed something spectacular, something we will never see again in this life.

It's worth remembering. It's worth celebrating. It's worth appreciating within the disappointments and failures. The sun comes out again. There will be chances to shine.

If we can.

If you like what you see here on Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do), please consider a visit to CC's Tip Jar. 

Carl's new book Gabba Gabba Hey! A Conversation With The Ramones is now available, courtesy of the good folks at Rare Bird Books. Gabba Gabba YAY!! https://rarebirdlit.com/gabba-gabba-hey-a-conversation-with-the-ramones-by-carl-cafarelli/

If it's true that one book leads to another, my next book will be The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1). Stay tuned. Your turn is coming.

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. Recent shows are archived at Westcott Radio. You can read about our history here.

I'm on Twitter @CafarelliCarl

10 SONGS: 9/2/2021--THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (VOLUME 1)

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 # 1092: The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1). Each entry is an excerpt from my long-threatened GREM! book.

ELVIS PRESLEY: Heartbreak Hotel

Elvis Presley's "Heartbreak Hotel"  was rock 'n' roll's equivalent of the shot heard 'round the world. A segregated America was about to be forced to integrate its pop charts in a manner without precedent, to look on in horror as its young embraced this race music, this primal beat, this blatantly sexual sound that their daughters would find orgasmic, that their sons would find irresistible. A white kid who could sing like a black man. Before long, more and more white kids would also listen to black performers, and pop music would change forever after. The roots of that change predate Elvis and "Heartbreak Hotel," but it is still impossible to overstate the cultural significance of this record. And it would be stupid to deny its lasting effect and appeal. One could only claim a handful of records as changing everything that followed. "Heartbreak Hotel" would top that list.

"Heartbreak Hotel" is the coronation of King Elvis I. Presley's Sun sides were his rise to power, but his reign begins at RCA, a declaration of Since my baby left me, I've found a new place to dwell signaling the dawn of a new era, a world without end, Amen. Elvis Presley is the single most iconic figure of American pop culture, and that status will probably never face any plausible challenge. The King is not dead. Long live the King.

WILLIE MAE "BIG MAMA" THORNTON: Hound Dog

We pin the launch of the Rock 'n' Roll Era to 1955, when "Rock Around The Clock" by Bill Haley and his Comets became a # 1 pop hit. That's a logical starting point. But even if Haley was this music's first crossover star, no one--no one--believes he and his cohorts invented that sound. Rock 'n' roll doesn't start with Bill Haley and his Comets, nor with that combo's previous billing as Bill Haley's Saddlemen (though it would also be wrong to deny their importance).

Where and when did rock 'n' roll start? There are a few key records that one could name as possibilities for the first rock 'n' roll record. "Rocket 88" by Jackie Brentson and his Delta Cats (1951, and really Ike Turner and his Kings of Rhythm) is the closest we have to a consensus choice, though some would point to "The Fat Man" by Fats Domino (1950). I would at least add Amos Milburn's "Down The Road Apiece" (1947) to the discussion, and no less an authority than Lenny and Squiggy (on TV's Laverne And Shirley) spoke on behalf of "Call The Police," a 1941 single Nat King Cole made with the King Cole Trio. There are other progenitors and trailblazers from across the heady mingling of jump blues, R & B, country, and swing that birthed this bastard child we call rock 'n' roll. What was the daddy of them all? Not even a blood test is going to make that determination.

"Hound Dog" is not the first rock 'n' roll record, but its original release does predate the Rock 'n' Roll Era. It was written by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller specifically for rhythm and blues singer Big Mama Thornton, and Thornton's "Hound Dog" single topped the R & B chart in 1953. Fittingly, her performance of the song is as much a growl as it is anything else, a snarling dismissal of a worthless cur who can wag his tail, but she ain't gonna feed him no more.

THE 13th FLOOR ELEVATORS: You're Gonna Miss Me

We are the weird.

We are damaged, disturbed, inadequate, unprepared. We don't fit in, couldn't if we tried, wouldn't if we could. We wake up wondering, find ourselves all alone. We live in a time of our own.

The late Roky Erickson is often remembered as a casualty, a fragile fallen angel, a flawed Icarus who flew too close to a merciless psychedelic sun. He sang of walking with zombies, of working in the Kremlin for a two-headed dog. Against type, he sang a beautiful ballad called "Starry Eyes," suddenly (if briefly) becoming a post-lysergic Buddy Holly. He warned ominously of the danger of slandering him. His mortal form was caged, in correctional facilities and sanitariums. His mind roamed where only wild things go.

With his '60s combo the 13th Floor Elevators, Roky Erickson sang of fire in the bones, of taking us to the empty place in his fire engine, of Easter everywhere. He was damaged. And with the 13th Floor Elevators, he gave us an incredible, unforgettable rock 'n' roll classic called "You're Gonna Miss Me." 

"You're Gonna Miss Me" is acid made punk, as hallucinatory as Syd Barrett-era Pink Floyd, as badass as...anything, ever. It's the embodiment of the rock-critic concept of 1960s garage-built psychedelia, while sounding not quite like any of its peers. 

It could only have come from Texas. It profoundly influenced at least one son of the Lone Star State: Billy Gibbons, later to find fame slingin' his sharp-dressed six-string with ZZ Top. Contemporary to the Elevators, Gibbons played with a group called the Moving Sidewalks, whose own awesome single "99th Floor" couldn't have popped into being without "You're Gonna Miss Me" providing a blueprint. "You're Gonna Miss Me" has continued to glow in the dark for all subsequent generations seeking the sound of electric guitars crossed with electric sugar cubes. 

TODD RUNDGREN: Couldn't I Just Tell You

This is an example of the latest musical trend. It's called power pop.

It was 1978. The band Utopia was appearing on The Mike Douglas Show. The song that Utopia's front man Todd Rundgren introduced as "the latest musical trend" was practically a golden oldie, a track Rundgren had recorded and released much earlier in the decade, on his 1972 album Something/Anything? The song "Couldn't I Just Tell You had not been a hit, its 1972 single release barely making it into the Hot 100, peaking at # 93 with an anchor. For Rundgren to refer to this six-year-old song as the latest...anything could have only been an example of the prickly performer sneering haughtily at trendy hipsters, hip trendsters, and, one supposes, anyone who liked pop music. Yeah, screw them.

Wait, wait! "Anyone who liked pop music?" That's me he was sneering at, damn it! Oh, the humanity...!

But I didn't care. God, it was such a great song. Seeing it performed on TV asserted the song's hold on me, a hold that was already there, but which tightened its grip securely and permanently with this televised faux embrace of the latest musical trend. Power pop. Suits me just fine.

SHOES: Tomorrow Night

Shoes was one of the most notable (and durable) among '70s power pop groups, an exquisite four-man band from Zion, Illinois. Shoes took their first step with an album that was literally homemade, recorded in guitarist Jeff Murphy’s living room and released on the group’s own Black Vinyl label in 1977.  

That album, Black Vinyl Shoes, was an instant pop classic, bursting with understated gems, songs simultaneously Beatlesque yet not strictly derivative of anything. Black Vinyl Shoes brought the group to the attention of Bomp Records/Bomp! magazine visionary Greg Shaw. Bomp released a non-LP 45 of  “Tomorrow Night”/”Okay,” which still ranks as the best 1-2 punch of Shoes’ always-distinguished recording career. 

"Tomorrow Night" is nearly textbook power pop, a pretty ditty that combines yearning and lust, its façade suggesting an equal measure of the two, but really looking for a steamy tomorrow-night stand. What the track lacks in explosiveness á la the Who or Raspberries is more than compensated by its confidence and posture, the music leaning forward with single-minded precision. It's catchy and aggressive, its dreamy, breathy vocals piloting a rockin' sound with one Beatle boot perched in the British Invasion and one ragged Converse stepping on a back-breaking crack in the New Wave of post-punk rock 'n' roll. 

THE FLAMIN' GROOVIES: Shake Some Action

Boom.

I've described the Flamin' Groovies' classic track "Shake Some Action" as sounding like an announcement of pop-rock Armageddon, and like the Beatles, Byrds, and Rolling Stones heading into the studio for a session with Phil Spector. And I don't think even that bit of willful hyperbole does the song justice.

As a college freshman in the Fall of 1977, I had my ear practically stapled to Brockport's student-run radio station WBSU, a closed-circuit AM signal heard only on campus. WBSU was where I first heard Blondie, Television, the Dictators, the Ramones, all based on my obsessive and insistent requests to finally hear more of this punk rock stuff I'd been reading about in (again!) Phonograph Record Magazine. I was also requesting the Monkees--WBSU's library included a copy of the group's then-rare 1970 LP, Changes, so my (often-futile) pleas for WBSU jocks to play something from Changes were my only opportunity to hear Davy Jones warble "I Never Thought It Peculiar." Okay, you may think it's peculiar, but I never did.

So yeah, I listened to WBSU all the time. And I remember one particularly revelatory afternoon of communing with BSU, as I heard a couple of terrific oldies that I didn't know at the time: "Five O'Clock World" by the Vogues and "Lies" by the Knickerbockers. I believe the DJ also played my request for "Any Way You Want It" by the Dave Clark Five. To top it off, I heard two contemporary groups I'd neither heard nor heard of before, both performing '60s covers: "The Batman Theme" by the Jam, and "Misery" by the Flamin' Groovies.

It was an inauspicious start for me with the Jam, who would later become one of my favorites. But the Groovies? Man, I was blown away by this band doing a credible cover of an early Beatles tune, and a somewhat lesser-known Beatles tune, at that. The Flamin' Groovies? Who the devil are the Flamin' Groovies?

An answer to that question wasn't immediately forthcoming...

...It would be well over a year before I paid any attention to this unsettled matter of the Flamin' Groovies' music. By the spring of 1979, a different friend, one who shared my fondness of punk and new wave, allowed me to borrow his copy of an import sampler LP called New Wave. This New Wave compilation had tracks by the New York Dolls, the Damned, the Dead Boys, the Ramones, the Runaways, Richard Hell and the Void-Oids, Talking Heads, and, of course, 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 like a communion with an ethereal, ultimate radio station beamin' to me from the heavens themselves. It's magic, and there's no other word that will do to describe it. 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.

My Groovies fandom began with a spin of "Misery" on WBSU, and exploded when I heard "Shake Some Action" on a record lent to me by a friend, a friend I would lose before very long. An announcement of pop-rock Armageddon. The cataclysm would bust out at full speed. Sad to say, but there would be casualties along the way. Armageddon's like that. 

Boom.

SLY AND THE FAMILY STONE: Everybody Is A Star

Success. Stardom. Excess. Sly and the Family Stone generated hits, created influence, made some cash, and fed some bad habits along the way. The music was often phenomenal, a uniquely psychedelic hybrid that was absolutely rock and absolutely soul. The personal toll of this success, the weight of its numbing and high-flying rewards, would not be small. Its cost to Sly Stone in particular would be considerable.

"Dance To The Music." "Everyday People." "Stand." "I Want To Take You Higher." The gorgeously inviting "Hot Fun In The Summertime." "Thank You Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin," the latter of which should probably also be credited for teaching '70s U.K. glam rockers Slade how to spell. This is a great run of great singles, and that's just the singles. The albums that spawned them are acknowledged classics. 1971 brought the group another hit (the # 1 smash "Family Affair") and only # 1 album, There's A Riot Goin' On. From this pinnacle, a fall from grace was set to follow.

But: before that. Before drugs and spiraling craziness did all the destructive things they do so well, the B-side of "Thank You Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin" offers the dignity of acceptance, the quiet, welcoming comfort of a hand to hold and a shoulder to lean on. "Everybody Is A Star" is a casual, unassuming masterpiece, its groove so inviting, its sentiment so naturally easy and at peace. 

Everybody is a star
Who could rain and chase the dust away

You don't need darkness to do what you think is right. In the words of another song: this little light of mine, I'm gonna let it shine. Even as we wish for better, stronger, faster, more beautiful, a light within can show the way home. Andy Warhol said everyone would be famous for fifteen minutes. He was wrong. Everybody is a star, loved for who we are, not the ones we think we need to be. 

THE VELVET UNDERGROUND: I'll Be Your Mirror

Such a pretty song from such a shadowed origin, from such seemingly malevolent minstrels. For all the iconoclasm we associate with Lou Reed and the Velvet Underground, "I'll Be Your Mirror" is very nearly a conventional pop song. For the lead vocal, the harder edges of Nico's Teutonic voice soften just enough to suggest a vulnerability, an understanding and empathy we might not expect. Reed's lyrics provide comfort for the crippled feeling within, against the gnawing internal ache that insists we can't be good enough, can't dare to dream of adequacy much less divinity, against a certainty that inside we're twisted and unkind. I find it hard to believe you don't know the beauty you are. There's a hint of darkness, but a possibility of a hand to our darkness so we won't be afraid. Please put down your hands, 'cause I see you. The reflection is more forgiving than we expected.

DEL SHANNON: Runaway

The man formerly known as Charles Westover despaired. On February 8th of 1990, he took a .22 caliber rifle and ended his lives as Del Shannon and Charles Westover impartially. There would be no more walking in the rain, tears falling, feeling the pain. Despair finally made Del Shannon run away. He was 55 years old.

Many of Del Shannon's classic hits are compressed, almost claustrophobic little jolts of tension, fear, frustration, longing, loneliness, alienation, and even paranoia. Yet they sound so invigorating, so full of life lived against the odds, that it's even more unfortunate that Shannon couldn't achieve the catharsis offered in his own songs. 

"Runaway" was his first and biggest hit, a # 1 smash for four weeks in 1961. The track is propelled in large part by the weird and haunting sound of a musitron, an electric organ played by Max Crook, who co-wrote the song with Shannon. Over and above the unique atmosphere supplied by the musitron, "Runaway" weeps and wails with Del Shannon at its fragile and desperate center, a lonely soul who has lost his one chance at love and happiness.

THE COCKTAIL SLIPPERS: St. Valentines Day Massacre

"St. Valentine's Massacre" is a welcome earworm, maddeningly catchy, sounding incongruously bouncy while reflecting on love's uncertainty and rushing fearlessly and fatalistically toward an affair's assured and imminent end. 

Am I still penciled in on your calendar?
Am I still the late night call when you've got nothing to say?
I know it's Thanksgiving night, and you say you love me
But who'll be the last lover standing come Saint Valentine's Day?

I'm thinking a box of chocolates isn't gonna cut it this time.

Little Steven Van Zandt's lyrics here imply a lovers' drama playing out in rapidly elapsing time. Was it adventure, was it fear, or sanctuary? Modesty Blaze's voice is tinged with both regret and resignation as she sings; behind her and with her, her band of sisters seems hellbent on holding an Irish wake for broken hearts. Across the calendar pages that fly by with cruel indifference--Thanksgiving night, Christmas morning, New Year's Eve--a love that can't even evolve from pencil to ink careens toward its inevitable erasure come the 14th of February. Now even your carrier pigeons have been picked off by the vultures/There's only one thing left for you to confess.... The song flies to its foregone conclusion on a conjugal bed of the most bittersweet la la la la lala las in rock 'n' roll history.

WAITWAITWAITWAITWAIT! 

We got more of THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE!

THE T-BONES: No Matter What Shape (Your Stomach's In)

One of 1965's final hit records was a cover of the music from an Alka Seltzer commercial. See? Best pop year ever! Granted, the T-Bones' "No Matter What Shape (Your Stomach's In)" was really a 1966 hit--its Billboard chart peak at  # 3 was in February of '66--but it was released in December 1965, so...close enough, I say. I had the 45 on the Liberty Records label, and it was The Greatest Record Ever Made. I'd play that sucker on the family hi-fi, dancing around our little living room as the song created images in my daydreamin' little head. I would close my eyes. I swear, I could see the music. I saw colors, shapes, figures, even a brightly-garbed clown a-boppin' and a-swayin' to the tune. I was a weird kid. Still am. Nearly six decades later, the music still means as much to me as it meant when I was five, and as when I was three, when I was twelve, eighteen, twenty-four, thirty-six, forty, fifty, and on down the dark and twisting path ahead of me. It's best played loud. No matter what shape.

THE RAMONES: Blitzkrieg Bop

1-2-3-4.

The Ramones set out to be the American Beatles. They succeeded, as long as we don't factor in extraneous things like fame, popularity, record sales, and money. But impact? Immortality? The buzz of irresistible pop perfection? Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're forming in a straight line. 

It started here, with a fab four of misfits from Queens aimin' for the toppermost of the poppermost, plausibility be damned. What, the Bay City Rollers were already trying to be the next Beatles? Fine. The Ramones would be a faster and louder version, innately more fascinating, emphatically more American. Imagining a chant like S! A! T-U-R! D-A-Y! NIGHT!! to be a prerequisite for radio success, the Ramones revamped the Rollers' approach into their own HEY-HO, LET'S GO!  Number one with a bullet? Not even close. Shoot 'em in the back now.

Nonetheless....

Failing to ship and sell the massive volume of hit platters they envisioned, the Ramones kept going anyway. The kids are losing their minds. All revved up and ready to go. 

The Ramones. The American Beatles. Yeah, that sounds about right to me.

Let's GO!

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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.

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