5 ABOVE: Songs With "Heart" In The Title

5 Above picks five great things within a specific category. Look out below--these are five that rise above.

Well, it was just a couple of days ago that I used a 5 Above column to tie in with the Only Three Lads podcast, anticipating an imminent episode where O3L hosts Uncle Gregg and Brett Vargo (and a Third Lad to be named later) will each offer a list of favorite albums that ya gotta own on vinyl. The question intrigued me enough that I decided to provide my own Top Five list of vinyl imperatives in response.

Each episode of O3L poses a Top Five challenge along those lines, with answers usually limited to stuff from the O3L classic alternative era of 1974-1999. And I don't know if I wanna get in the habit of answering those weekly challenges here at Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do) HQ...but I don't know if don't wanna get in that habit either. You think you never know with me? Man, I never know with me.

Either way, after I wrote that previous 5 Above vinyl list, I finished listening to the most recent O3L, a two-part conversation with members of the Darling Buds, which found our assembled lads and ladette addressing the question of top five songs with the word "heart" in the title. And I found myself once again compelled to participate.

I spent the metric equivalent of no time at all coming up with this list. If I just looked at my iPod, I'd probably come up with a dozen more worthies. But the 5 Above placed paradoxically below are the five that occurred to me first.

HONORABLE MENTION 1: Not really, because it doesn't qualify. But mentioning "heart" makes me think of the band Heart, and thinking of the band Heart makes me think of that time when I was 17 in 1977, and a teen girl introduced me to Heart's "Kick It Out" while telling me about her ambition to pose for Playboy. That's...actually the whole story, but I padded it like a bra here.

HONORABLE MENTION 2: "Some Hearts" by Marshall Crenshaw. I don't even mind Carrie Underwood's version.

HONORABLE MENTION 3: "Heart And Soul" by the Monkees, the first single and best track from their uneven 1987 album Pool It! Sure, the album's iffy, but "Heart And Soul" is solid, its video was perfect, and it shoulda been a hit. Its path to chart success was impeded in part by T'Pau's contemporaneous smash record with the.same title, but the real blame lies with swinish programming mooks 'n' suits at MTV, who snubbed audience demand for the Monkees and instead suffocated the resurgent Monkeemania the network itself had helped to build just the year before. Bastards.

Now: Let's lay our hearts on the line.

5. LYRES WITH STIV BATORS: Here's A Heart

When I lived in Buffalo in the '80s, the Buff State radio station WBNY-FM hooked me on Boston's phenomenal fuzz combo Lyres and their Nuggets-worthy album On Fyre. I'd already been listening to Stiv Bators for a few years by then, commencing with his work fronting the Dead Boys while I was still in college in the '70s, his incredible power pop solo singles and album for Bomp Records after that, and his subsequent role as the lead singer of Lord of the New Church; I don't recall if I heard our Stiv's interim stint with the Wanderers before I heard the Lords or later on, after the fact. My Buffalo years had their ups, downs, and way-downs, but they did grant me opportunities to see separate club shows by Lyres and the Lords of the New Church, and I remain grateful for my good fortune.

I fell particularly hard for On Fyre, and often proclaimed (as a compliment) that Lyres didn't just want to be like the early Kinks, they wanted to BE the early Kinks. Cool goal! They succeeded in being Lyres, and that was fine by me.

Here's a heart crying out for love

Here's a heart that's been guilty of loving you too much

"Here's A Heart" was originally recorded by 1960s British popmeisters Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Tich. I dig a lot of DDDBM&T (especially "Hold Tight"), but I don't even remember their "Here's A Heart." To me, the song belongs to Lyres and Stiv Bators, who combined forces for this 1988 single.

4. ACTION SWINGERS: No Heart And Soul

Listen: a band cool enough to twist the title of my favorite Sweet album Desolation Boulevard into their own Decimation Blvd merits immediate props in these quarters. I'd never heard of Action Swingers before plucking a used copy of that 1993 CD out of a record rack at a store in Lake George, NY some years after its release, but the punk urgency of "No Heart And Soul" got my attention, and it earned significant spinnage on This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio.

3. THE FLASHCUBES: Sold Your Heart

"Sold Your Heart" by Flashcubes guitarist Paul Armstrong was one of my many Cubic fave raves in the late '70s, a loud and angry rant about the ache of rejection. But it's also pop, catchy as an STD, its rage borne by hooks, its melody unashamed to proclaim its essential pissed-offedness. The track was one of the Flashcubes' demos, originally unreleased, repunched and reclaimed for public consumption on the 1997 collection Bright Lights.

It was also a staple of the Flashcubes' live sets in '79, and the definitive "Sold Your Heart" is preserved on Flashcubes On Fire, a 2022 CD release of an absolutely incendiary 'Cubes show recorded at The Firebarn in Syracuse on May 26, 1979. My liner notes for that album explain why I'm such a fan; the disc itself provides an insistent, high-volume CASE CLOSED! in that regard.

2. THE RAMONES: Poison Heart

It's a given that my list would include the Ramones. My initial pick was "Listen To My Heart" from the Ramones' 1976 debut album Ramones, but "Poison Heart" (from 1992's Mondo Bizarro) emerged unbidden as the best choice. Mondo Bizarro was the first Ramones album recorded after bassist, songwriter, and founding member Dee Dee Ramone abruptly split from the group, but Dee Dee continued to write and submit songs to his erstwhile brudders-in-arms. Dee Dee co-wrote "Poison Heart" with Daniel Ray, and it's one of the very best latter-day Ramones tracks: Moody, surly, seething with a restlessness it can neither deny nor identify, delivered at a pace that breaks no necks but still simmers with the pure poison of resentment. 

D-U-M-B? It turned out that accusation was incorrect. 

1. THE SEARCHERS: Hearts In Her Eyes 

The Greatest Record Ever Made!

And DAMN, I just thought of "Radio Heart" by Willie Alexander and the Boom Boom Band. But the list stands as is. Its heart, at least, is in the right place.

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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: 4/28/2023

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 # 1178. This show is available as a podcast.

THE RAMONES: 7 And 7 Is

This week's show concludes our four-week tour through the Ramones' studio album discography. Throughout the month of April, we've been playing my # 1 top track from each of the group's albums, four per week, and we begin our latest bopathon with representation from the Ramones' thirteenth album Acid Eaters.

Released in 1993, Acid Eaters is the Ramones' only all-covers album, sporting da brudders' piledriving takes on 1960s classics by the Who, Jefferson Airplane, the Rolling Stones, the Seeds, Eric Burdon and the Animals, et al. The Ramones had included a cover or two on most of their previous albums, so this seemed like an intriguing project.

Bassist C. J. Ramone wasn't so sure about it. In the 1994 interview reprised in my book Gabba Gabba Hey! A Conversation With The Ramones, C. J. told me, "...I really wasn’t for it. I thought it was a bit too nostalgic, kind of concentrating on a...something that could almost be detrimental to our image. It seems like people think of too much of the past when it comes to the Ramones. You hear so much of the Ramones’ history and not enough about what’s going on about the Ramones now. And I think that hurts them sometimes. And I thought that this album was just contributing to that. I still think it is...."

Me? I raved about Acid Eaters when it was new, and cooled to it some time thereafter. To represent the album on this week's show, I figured I'd default to the C.J.-sung version of Bob Dylan's "My Back Pages," a track that stood out for me at the time of its release. But in prepping for the show, I listened to Acid Eaters again, for the first time in...well, I can't count that high. I was surprised by how much I flat-out dig the album in the here and now, not just more than I expected to dig it, but possibly even more than I liked it in '93.

"My Back Pages" was still in the potential mix for this week's playlist, as was the Pete Townshend-augmented cover of "Substitute." I went with this steamrollin' version of Love's "7 And 7 Is," and delighted in the ongoing revelation of rediscovering old favorites.

MICKEY AND SYLVIA: Love Is Strange

A spin of Mickey and Sylvia's "Dearest" on last week's show led us back to their big hit "Love Is Strange" this week. What a great record, and its been far, far too long since its last appearance on TIRnRR. In our chat group Sunday night, intrepid listener Joel Tinnel commented, "The guitar is pretty hip for its day. I believe Mickey (of 'Mickey and Sylvia' fame) is the player as well as the vocalist." Our pal (and Radio Deer Camp host) Rich Firestone added, "I thought it sounded great coming out of '7 And 7 Is' because the Ramones didn't do the closing vamp from the Love record. Almost sounded like Mickey's guitar was gonna play it!"

MR. BRUCE GORDON: One Last Dance

Mr. Bruce Gordon is a long-time friend of this show. Bruce is also a welcome perennial fixture on our playlists, both as a member of the mighty Pop Co-Op and under his previous nom de bop Mr. Encrypto. Ditching "Encrypto" and retaining the honorific, Mr. Bruce Gordon has a new album due in May, courtesy of the good folks at Futureman Records. One Tall Order is the first record this peerless pop mister has done under his own name, and we are firmly on board. One LAST dance? Nuh-uh. First of many. First of many.

THE FLIRTATIONS: How Can You Tell Me?

My gosh, why weren't the Flirtations bigger stars? Their lone hit "Nothing But A Heartache" was phenomenal, and granted, nothing else in their catalog quite equals the sheer splendor of that track. Nonetheless, there's more fabulous Flirtations material beyond just the one big record. Their 1969 album Sounds Like The Flirtations (titled Nothing But A Heartache in the US) is worth a listen or two thousand. This week's radio exercise includes "How Can You Tell Me?," which was the B-side of "Nothing But A Heartache" in the States. We'll hear more from the Flirtations next week.

THE RAMONES: I Don't Want To Grow Up

The Ramones' final studio album ¡Adios Amigos! saw the group go out with a blitzkrieg bang. And the album opens with a cover of Tom Waits' "I Don't Want To Grow Up," one of the greatest tracks ever to bear the Ramones brand name. It's not merely my favorite from ¡Adios Amigos!; when S. W. Lauden interviewed me last week for Remember The Lightning's feature on my Ramones book, he asked me to name my top five Ramones tracks, and "I Don't Want To Grow Up" is perched firmly at # 3 (behind only "Blitzkrieg Bop" and "Sheena Is A Punk Rocker"). 

HEART: Kick It Out

The Greatest Record Ever Made!

(Powered by '70s teen pheromones.)

THE FLASHCUBES: Nothing To Do

IT'S A SECRET! Man, why am I even mentioning this to you?

THE RAMONES: Babysitter

With the Ramones' fourteen studio albums accounted for, we turn to my favorite among the group's non-LP tracks. "Babysitter" did appear on later European pressings of 1977's Leave Home album, but in America it was the non-LP B-side of the 1978 "Do You Wanna Dance" 45. At the time, I believed both sides of this single were destined to become irresistible, inescapable rock 'n' roll radio/Top 40 juggernauts. 

And they should have been. 

THE PALEY BROTHERS AND RAMONES: Come On Let's Go

Before we move from the Ramones' studio works into their live albums on next week's show, we celebrate the best of the group's soundtrack contributions. Ignoring "Chop Suey" (from the 1983 film Get Crazy), all of the main contenders come from the Ramones' own movie Rock 'n' Roll High School, which includes the absolutely ace title tune, the wonderful ballad "I Want You Around," and an eleven-minute live track (billed as a medley, encompassing blistering in-concert performances of "Blitzkrieg Bop," "Teenage Lobotomy," "California Sun," "Pinhead," and "She's The One"). Each of these has something to recommend it: the teen rebellion of "Rock 'n' Roll High School" emphasizing the film's rockin' raison d'être, the engaging chime of "I Want You Around" (accompanied on-screen by the image of actress P. J. Soles in her underwear), and, y'know, ELEVEN MINUTES OF LIVE RAMONES! Can't go wrong here.

Going into this, I presumed "Rock 'n' Roll High School" would be a given. Instead, I picked "Come On Let's Go," a dynamic cover of the Ritchie Valens gem, as performed by the Ramones backing up the Paley Brothers. The track had previously been released as a single in 1978, recorded when Joey Ramone was sidelined by an injury. Joey recalled, "It was a single before it was on the soundtrack. I was laid up, and John and Tommy and Dee Dee, they did the track with the Paley Brothers singin’ the lead. It sounded very Everly Brothersish. I thought it came out great."

Johnny Ramone also remembered the circumstances of the recording. "We negotiated a hundred bucks each [laughs], big money. And I said, 'Great! Hundred bucks for the night here, I’ll go in and do it.' Went in, put the record on, had Tommy figure out how to play it, [and he] showed me how to play it. I think I did two takes and said, 'that’s it, that’s as good as I’m gonna play it. I’m done.' And it came out good. The faster you do it, the better it comes out."

P. J. SOLES: Rock 'n' Roll High School

Still hadda get "Rock 'n' Roll High School" into this week's playlist. Enter Riff Randell. rock 'n' roller, the Ramones' # 1 fan. Take it, P. J.!

NEXT WEEK: we finish April with a track apiece from the four official live albums the Ramones released during their career. We'll begin with a track from my favorite live album ever.

If you like what you see here on Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do), please consider supporting this blog by becoming a patron on Patreon, or by visiting CC's Tip Jar. Additional products and projects are listed here.

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!!

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

POP-A-LOOZA: THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! Heart, "Kick It Out"

Each week, the pop culture website Pop-A-Looza shares some posts from my vast 'n' captivating Boppin' (Like The Hip Folks Do) archives. The latest shared post is another exciting entry in my ongoing saga of The Greatest Record Ever Made!, this time revvin' the ol' engine on behalf of "Kick It Out" by Heart.

An infinite number of tracks can each be THE greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. My long-threatened book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) is built from that premise, and its current blueprint includes this very chapter about Heart. As noted recently, I'm in the process of reducing the number of songs given entries in the book. I've had the total as high as 205 (200 songs plus five bonus tracks), got it down to 175 at the last update, and last week I announced a goal of cutting its final tally at 155. As of now, I'm thinking it should be 160 songs (155 plus the five bonus tracks). Additional hype and amendments to follow.

Heart's "Kick It Out" is still a part of that plan. It's not that I like "Kick It Out" more than I like, say, "Summer In The City" by the Lovin' Spoonful or "I'll Feel A Whole Lot Better" by the Byrds--the subjects of two completed entries that I have removed from the book's prospective Table of Contents--but I do think the Heart piece fits the flow of the book better than either of those chapters would. GREM! was never intended to be an inclusive list of the best songs ever, and it deliberately omits a number of my all-time Fave Raves. This book (and this series) were always supposed to be a celebration of the immediate, all-encompassing thrill of a single track annexing your mind, heart, body, and soul for one rapturous moment, no matter how brief or fleeting that moment may be. Maybe you'll forget about the song after it's done. Maybe it'll stay with you forever. Either way, for the brilliant duration of its infinite turn, it's the greatest. 

Even if something shinier replaces it.

Another update to the GREM! project is forthcoming. In the mean time, we look back at the time a pretty girl convinced me that maybe her new favorite song should also be my favorite song. And who can argue with that? Heart's "Kick It Out" is the subject of the latest Boppin' Pop-A-Looza.

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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
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I'm on Twitter @CafarelliCarl.

THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE: Kick It Out

This was originally written as a part of one of my weekly 10 Songs entries. The version seen here has been tweaked ever-so-slightly for eventual inclusion in my proposed book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1).

An infinite number of songs can each be the greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Today, THIS is THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE!

HEART: Kick It Out

Written by Ann Wilson
Produced by Mike Flicker
Single from the album Little Queen, Portrait Records, 1977

The original post has been unpublished for bookkeeping purposes. It can be seen as a chapter in my book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1)

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You can support this blog by becoming a patron on Patreon: Fund me, baby! 

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.

10 SONGS: 7/15/2020

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 # 1033. The Badfinger entry previously appeared at the pop culture website Pop-A-Looza.

BADFINGER: Day After Day



Badfinger was my favorite act on the radio in the early '70s. It's no coincidence that the first entry in my series The Greatest Record Ever Made! was Badfinger's "Baby Blue," nor was there ever any likelihood of me choosing any other song to open my eventual GREM! book. 

Have to repeat the mantra for those who came in late: An infinite number of songs can each be THE greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. "Baby Blue" stands out as my favorite among Badfinger favorites, and if I had to pick just one--ONE!!--song and stick with it as GREM!, "Baby Blue" would be among the finalists. But I loved all of the Badfinger songs I heard on the radio when I was in middle school. "Come And Get It," the song Paul McCartney gave to the lads, was wonderful, but the singles written by the group's own Pete Ham were better. "Baby Blue," of course. "No Matter What," which many think of as Badfinger's signature tune. And this irresistible ballad "Day After Day."

I am not generally a ballad guy, except on those occasions when I am. I'm infinite, too. "Day After Day" just soars, its heartfelt tale of devotion and longing propelled by a sound taken straight from Abbey Road, a sliding guitar that seems to mourn and hope at the same time, piano that proclaims '70s pop music in all the best ways, harmonies, the experiences of love, wishes, dreams, regret, and AM radio all made as one. 

The Fab Five: Arty Lenin, Gary Frenay, Dave Miller, Dave Novak, Paul Davie

In 2004, Syracuse musician and promoter Paul Davie organized a live event to commemorate the 40th anniversary of The Beatles' first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show. Paul's own British Invasion tribute combo The Fab Five would play a set of period-appropriate covers and a set duplicating The Beatles' performances for ol' Stoneface Sullivan back in '64. The Fab Five would also back up Terry Sylvester of The Hollies and Badfinger's Joey Molland in separate sets. 

Screen Test in the '80s: Arty, Tommy, Gary

The Fab Five at that time included Gary Frenay and Arty Lenin from The Flashcubes and Screen Test, along with Davie, local music legend Dave Novak, and veteran drummer Dave Miller. As mentioned in my liner notes for the Screen Test anthology Inspired Humans Making Noise, Dave Miller wasn't as familiar with the Badfinger material as he was with the rest of the evening's rockin' pop syllabus, so NYC-based 'Cubes/Screen Test drummer Tommy Allen agreed to come back to the 'Cuse for a Screen Test gig on Friday night and the Badfinger portion of the British Invasion show Saturday night. Joey Molland also showed up at that Friday night Screen Test show, and he joined the lads for an unplanned, incredible rendition of "No Matter What," setting a high bar for Saturday night's show.

Joey Molland, Gary Frenay

The next evening's show met that bar, maybe even surpassed it. It was neither the first time nor the last time I saw Molland perform, but it was without question the best time. Molland just cooked with the fab quintet of Screen Test plus Davie and Novak. Our Joey acquitted himself well on Badfinger's hits and album tracks, singing most of the leads, including those originally done by the late Pete Ham. But for "Day After Day," Molland ceded the lead mic to Arty Lenin.

And Arty friggin' owned it.

I was 34 years old, a drink in one hand, my lovely wife Brenda on my arm. But I was also 11-12 years old again, my ears stapled to WOLF-AM and WNDR-AM in '71 and '72, hearing music that promised something better than my adolescent doldrums, my preteen angst, looking out of my lonely gloom, day after day. It was...everything, the good and the bad, with good winning out in storybook fashion. I was nearly speechless. After the set, I found my voice and walked up to Arty to say,"Dude, you are Badfinger!"

Pop music is a time machine. It's not just memories, and it's not just the past, because all the things we saw and heard and felt and tasted and dreamed and cried over or bled for remain with us. Always. The records don't remind us--we would remember anyway--but the sound connects us, then and now, now to then. I don't want to be 12 again. I wouldn't mind having a little more hair, a few less pounds, and a better back, and it sure would be nice to skip one or a hundred of the heartbreaks along the way. But living is now, ending in -ing rather than -ed. Every day, my mind is all around you. Turn it up. Every day, I feel the tears that you weep. It's okay. Night after night. Day after day.

We have time.



THE CARPENTERS: Only Yesterday



I enjoyed the music of The Carpenters until I decided that I wanted to be too cool to enjoy the music of The Carpenters. Luckily, I outgrew the silly notion of being too cool for...well, anything. C'mon; dig what you dig. While I never gained (or regained) any transcendent affection for The Carpenters' more MOR material, I respect their talent, and I still like "Rainy Days And Mondays." And I love "Only Yesterday." It's smooth and sweet, as one would expect from The Carpenters, but it has its own kick, its own spirit. I associate the song with a memory of an awful day, years after its reign as a hit record; I heard it on the radio less than 24 hours after the last time I saw one of my best friends alive. Yet the song is welcome even now, its tangential connection to sadness and grief less important than my recollection of the song making me smile at a time when I needed to remember how to smile. July 1st of 1979, on my way to a Flashcubes show. More than forty years ago. And still: only yesterday.

HEART: Kick It Out



As discussed in last week's 10 Songs, with another dedication to Miss August, wherever she is. (Also with a better-sounding copy of the track than what I foisted on you last time.)

HONEY CONE: Want Ads



Another staple of my AM radio days, Honey Cone's effervescent bubblesoul hit "Want Ads" is only my second favorite Honey Cone track; the lesser hit "One Monkey Don't Stop No Show" is even better than "Want Ads," and I'm way overdue for greater diligence in checking out the Honey Cone songbook. Betcha there's more where these came from.

THE JANGLE BAND: So Long



Because we only have three hours a week to program the glittery pop prizes that capture our short attention spans, and because we have to fit those songs in alongside back-announcements, banter, legal IDs, show bumpers, hourly acknowledgements of our sponsors, and my ongoing attempts to pull off sight gags on the radio, a lot of great songs don't get the repeat play they deserve. I am really, really fond of this 2020 effort by Australia's phenomenal pop combo The Jangle Band, yet I think this is only its second appearance on our playlist. Its lack of airplay so far is not a fair reflection of my interest in the track; it is, frankly, one of the best new songs I've heard this year. We need to play it more often. Maybe I'll skip one of my sight gags.

KID GULLIVER: I Wanna Be A Pop Star



Kid Gulliver joins our little Play-Tone Galaxy O' Stars in the aftermath of last week's spin of "Queen Of The Drive-In" by WhistleStop Rock. While my interest in WhistleStop Rock was fueled by my current obsession with "Vengeance" by Justine and the Unclean--the perfectly clean Justine Covault plays guitar on "Queen Of The Drive-In"--the WSR track also led me to its lead singer Simone Berk and her own able combo Kid Gulliver. For those of you who know and love a terrific 2007 song called "Famous" by the Swedish group Marmalade Souls, "I Wanna Be A Pop Star" provides a worthy complement, both tracks centered upon the often empty nature of flash-in-the-pan celebrity, and both transcending the subject of the Lindsay Kardashian du jour with the sound of bona fide pop music. In the (perhaps unlikely) event I can remember to follow through, we'll see if we can play both Marmalade Souls and Kid Gulliver on next week's show.

THE MONKEES: Daily Nightly

Psychedelic! Micky Dolenz sets the Moog on stun while reciting Michael Nesmith's stream-of-WTF lyrics about the 1966 demonstrations on the Sunset Strip. In an interview on The Monkees' TV show, Dolenz mused that newspaper reporters mis-characterized the demonstrations as a riot because "riot" only has four words and is easier to spell. Separate from the interviews, the stunning black and white "Daily Nightly" video--Darkened rolling figures move through prisms of no color--also aired on the show, and I was duly hypmotized. From my favorite Monkees album, Pisces, Aquarius, Capricorn & Jones, Ltd.



SLY AND THE FAMILY STONE: Hot Fun In The Summertime


My interest in the Sly and the Family Stone catalog has been growing lately. I've still been focused on the hits--"Trip To Your Heart" has been the only (relatively) lesser-known Sly track to grab my attention, prompted by the familiar hook sampled by LL Cool J for "Mama Said Knock You Out"--and I'll need to do a deeper dive into the deeper tracks in the near future. But man, those hits! "Everybody Is A Star" earns a chapter in my GREM! book, and "Stand!," "Everyday People," and "Dance To The Music" remain relentlessly righteous. Ditto for "Hot Fun In The Summertime," which readers of Trouser Press voted the all-time # 1 summer song in a readers poll in the early '80s. Another illustration of my infinite-number concept for GREM!: I could have just as easily chosen "Hot Fun In The Summertime" instead of "Everybody Is A Star" for discussion in the book. 

THE SMITHEREENS with ANDY WHITE: Love Me Do



This is pretty cool. The late Andy White was a drummer whom record producer George Martin brought in to pound them pagan skins on The Beatles' sessions for both "Love Me Do" and "P.S. I Love You" in 1962. Martin hadn't been satisfied with work by the group's own drummer Pete Best, and arranged for White's presence in the studio before getting to know Best's abrupt replacement in the group, one Richard Starkey, aka Ringo Starr. I would not bet that our little Richard ever fully forgave Martin for the perceived snub, but they managed to become friendly and to work together peacefully and with great success for many years after that. (Ringo actually wound up playing on the British single version of "Love Me Do," though it is Andy White on the LP version, the American 45, and on "P.S. I Love You.")

When New Jersey's phenomenal pop combo The Smithereens were recording a series of Beatles covers in 2007 and 2008, they recruited Andy White to join them in the studio for remakes of his Beatles oeuvre. Neither track was released at the time, but both were just recently issued as a 45 available from The Smithereens themselves. Go ahead. Buy it. Ringo won't mind.

RINGO STARR: Photograph



Ringo Starr survived George Martin's initial rejection in '62, and had a better'n decent career (which is still going on). Ringo's drumming was criminally underrated for years. The tired jokes referred to him as the luckiest man in rock 'n' roll history, an amiable everylad who latched his Starr to the rising stars of those three other, more talented Beatles, and enjoyed the fab success of...y'know, Fabdom. It was never true; John, Paul, and George always knew they were lucky to have Ringo. Hell, as some have pointed out recently, Ringo may have been the best musician in the group to begin with.

Ringo's "Photograph" was all over radio in 1973, accompanied by rumors that it got by with a little help from its friends, a 3/4 Beatles reunion of Ringo, George Harrison, and John Lennon. Rumors notwithstanding, although Harrison was indeed on "Photograph," Lennon was not. But the accompanying album Ringo had John and George join Ringo on a track called "I'm The Greatest," and Paul McCartney also showed up, sequestered from former co-workers John and George on a separate track, "Six O'Clock." Nonetheless, Ringo was the first (and maybe only?) post-Beatles album ever to include all four of the guys who had collectively been the act you knew for all those years.



I remember one night in '73, my body in bed but my mind still awake, still tuned to the wizardry of my bedside radio. It was after midnight. I think I twiddled the dial to move from WOLF to WNDR, as I did sometimes, and heard a news report that The Beatles had reunited. I jumped out of bed to tell my Dad. The news didn't seem to thrill him quite as much as it thrilled me.



Did I imagine this news report? Dream it? I don't think so. Looking back, maybe whatever I'd heard had something to do with a quartet of former Beatles all appearing on the Ringo album, even if they didn't appear together.

Ringo just celebrated his 80th birthday, He doesn't look a day over 64. We have more than just photographs. So rock on, one time for Ringo.


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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:

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Carl's writin' a book! The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1) will contain 155 essays about 155 tracks, each one of 'em THE greatest record ever made. An infinite number of records can each be the greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Updated initial information can be seen here: THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE! (Volume 1).