5 ABOVE: Bands Who Were ALMOST Famous

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

As my nearly half-dozen regular readers are aware, I recently decided to cut back on blogging, reducing my posting schedule from its clinically stupid daily frequency to three or maybe four posts a week. So, of course, right after walkin' away from the ol' Bop a day grind, the latest episode of one of my favorite podcasts compels me to slap together a fifth post this week. Just when I think I'm out....

The podcast is Only Three Lads, the weekly celebration of classic alternative music from the '70s through the '90s. For this week's O3L, hosts Uncle Gregg and Brett Vargo, along with guest Third Lad Alex Boucher, discussed their choices for the top five bands who were almost famous. It's a fascinating subject, it made for a fascinating show, and it made me want to compile my own Top 5 list.

It's difficult for me to separate the idea of great bands who were almost famous from the idea of great bands who were unfairly obscure. They're similar categories, but not quite the same. The "almost famous" qualifier suggests we're specifically talking about acts who seemed poised to grab the brass ring in some big and spectacular way.

Before we get to my Top 5, let's mention a few acts who are just outside our chosen parameters:

TOO SOON!

The Remains and the Mynah Birds should be legit contenders to top anyone's list of rock's all-time Almosts, but both groups had their brief careers in the 1960s, predating the O3L era. The Remains were Boston's most popular rock combo in the mid '60s, and they seemed to have it all: Songs, talent, charisma, a major label deal, national TV exposure, and oh, by the way, THEY OPENED FOR THE BEATLES in 1966. They had everything but record sales. 

The Mynah Birds, with future superstars Rick James and Neil Young, were set to be Motown's first rock group, but they broke up when James was arrested for being AWOL from Uncle Sam.

THEY WERE FAMOUS! Then they weren't

The Cowsills and the Bay City Rollers had huge hits (in the '60s and '70s respectively), but the public at large was uninterested in their second acts. The Cowsills' 1998 album Global is my # 1 favorite album of the '90s, yet it's been an obscure rarity until its recent deluxe reissue.

When the Bay City Rollers' lead singer Les McKeown left the group at the end of the '70s, the remaining Rollers recruited new lead singer Duncan Faure, shortened their name to just "the Rollers," and released some very fine rockin' pop records that sold a metric bupkis.

FAMOUS...later

The Ramones. Icons now, so we can't claim they're a mere almost. At the time, though, they did not receive anywhere near the recognition or record sales they deserved.

And now...MY list of the Top 5 almost-famous bands of the O3L era.

5. ARTFUL DODGER

Artful Dodger released three albums on Columbia in the '70s, then a fourth (the long outta print Rave On) on Ariola. Live and on record alike, the group seemed like an irresistible cross between the best of Badfinger and the best of the Faces. I don't think I'd ever heard a note of their music before catching them at a club show in '79, but their performance nailed everything worth nailing. Goosebumps. Goosebumps, and a raised fist. Although they hailed from Virginia, I understand they were big, big stars in Cleveland, where they received notable FM radio exposure. The stardom did not translate elsewhere.

4. THE PANDORAS

There were at least two distinctly different phases of the Pandoras' career in the '80s. The original line-up was a proud product of the garage, armed with Nuggets-inspired attitude and a fantastic original song called "It's About Time." That version of the Pandoras exploded into rock and dust after just one album. Founding member Gwynne Kahn went on to form the magnificent Mad Monster Party, the single best '80s group that no one got to hear. Paula Pierce formed a new Pandoras group, which included Kim Shattuck, later of the Muffs.

Paula's version of the Pandoras recorded a brilliant pop album (Stop Pretending) for Rhino Records, and the group was subsequently signed to Mercury. They recorded an album called Come Inside, bigger things appeared imminent, but the record was never released. Mercury dropped the Pandoras without ever issuing even a single Pandoras track.

3. THE NEW YORK DOLLS

Everything I know and love about punk rock owes its rambunctious genesis to the New York Dolls. No Dolls? That would mean no Ramones, no Sex Pistols, no Clash, no punk scene, no new wave scene, no alternative scene; just something bland and boring in its place. The Dolls weren't built to last, but man, they were important, and man they were kickass fun. And they looked fine on television: Go watch 'em on YouTube clips from The Midnight Special, cavortin' and paradin' in America's face like they were--book it!!--The Next Big Thing. Stars. STARS!, I tell ya!

America turned its face to...well, probably to something bland and boring. The New York Dolls are not in The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame. Odds are they never will be. 

2. THE FLASHCUBES

Yeah, I know. Syracuse's own power pop powerhouse the Flashcubes never came close to breaking out, only released a couple of singles during their original 1977-1980 lifespan, never got a record deal. What's so almost famous! about that?

You. Weren't. There.

In the '70s, Flashcubes fans like me absolutely and completely believed the group was going to be huge. They were such a great live band, they wrote such irresistible songs, they had such sheer rock 'n' roll presence, that we all knew--knew--their stardom was inevitable. On paper, sure, I guess they never came all that close. But in our hearts, our imaginations? The first time I saw them, I was certain it was like seeing the Beatles at The Cavern. 

A few years back, I wrote a what-if story about what could have happened if the Flashcubes had achieved the success they deserved. But in that imaginary world, the Flashcubes stopped being Flashcubes. Our real world still has the Flashcubes--score a rare win for the real world! They're working on new recordings. I heard one of the new songs a couple of days ago, and it's guaranteed to be one of my favorite tracks in 2025.

Fame. Pfui. Who needs fame when you have the Flashcubes?

1. THE RUBINOOS

In this discussion of bands who almost hit it big, the Rubinoos are my unchallenged # 1. Unlike the Flashcubes, the Rubinoos did come tantalizingly close to the top, top, top of the pops. Their 1977 cover of Tommy James and the Shondells' "I Think We're Alone Now" missed the Top 40 by just five notches, and they seemed on the brink of mega success. I saw 'em on American Bandstand! They had the look, the image, the spirit, the chops, the charm...everything. 

And they had the songs. "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend" is like THE surefire # 1 hit that, y'know, didn't even chart. Didn't. Even. CHART?! Oh, the humanity! Hey, hey, you, you, I wanna see a recount!

But like the Flashcubes, the Rubinoos are still with us, still making extraordinary music, still putting on incredible live shows. I wish more people knew about them. 

But I'm glad I know about them.

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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.

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: 2/16/2024

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 # 1220. This show is available as a podcast.

WONDERBOY: Girl Songs

Back in the '90s, Wonderboy was a fantastic SoCal rockin' pop combo fronted by our old pal Robbie Rist. I've never even seen a copy of Wonderboy's eponymous 1992 debut album, but follow-ups Abbey Road To Ruin (1994) and Napoleon Blown Apart (1997) have been in my CD library since the proverbial ever. We've played Wonderboy on TIRnRR, we've played the esteemed Mr. Rist singin' with Popdudes, Quint, Ballzy Tomorrow, the Test Pressings, and solo, and we've played our Robbie working as an integral component of a number of other acts. The official record demonstrates that we, y'know, like Robbie Rist records.

But we did not know that Wonderboy recorded another album after Napoleon Blow Apart. 

The revelation came to us via The Spoon, the weekly podcast this Rist guy co-hosts with Chris Jackson and Thom Bowers. A recent Spooncast closed with a taste of "Girl Songs," a friggin' magnificent li'l gem from Wonderboy's originally unreleased album Hero Isle. Wonderboy recorded Hero Isle in (I think) the late '90s, working with studio magician Christian Nesmith; Christian and his wife Circe Link have also been fixtures on this little mutant radio show's playlists. Alas, Hero Isle was never released. Never released at all...

...wait.

What?

WHAT THE ACTUAL...?!!

Robbie did a digital self-release of Hero Isle. Well, that's good! Finally! Musta just been released, right? Right...?

It came out in 2018. 

We need better minions. Or, I guess, some minions. A minion. The buck stops somewhere over there. WAY over there.

Better late than...dammit, I wish we'd gotten to this sooner. But we're on it NOW! "Girl Songs" is a picture-perfect embrace of essential non-essentialness, eschewing weightier lyrical topics in favor of writin' catchy pop tunes about girls. 'Cause girls mean a lot to me!

We get the meaning, Robbie, and we agree. "Girl Songs" at long last makes its TIRnRR debut this week. We'll hear another Hero Isle track this Sunday night.

AND we'll hear "Girl Songs" again on Sunday, too. We have a big stack of time to overcompensate for. Girl songs? We're in.

[NOTE: Since this was posted, we have learned that Hero Isle was recorded before Napoleon Blown Apart, not after.]

BO DIDDLEY: Ooh Baby

It might not be strictly accurate to say I've been on a Bo Diddley kick, but it's true that a spin of the Diddley Daddy's incongruous (but swell!) bubblegum single "Bo Diddley 1969" on January 15th led to more Bo on each succeeding week. It's BO time!

Other than a spin of Diddley's "Background To A Music" (a song I learned from Cub Koda), all of the rest of my Bo picks in January and February have come from my 2-CD Bo Diddley compilation The Chess Box. From The Chess Box, we've heard "Bo Diddley 1969," "Pills," "Diddy Wah Diddy," and this week's bodacious Bo cut "Ooh Baby." We'll go back to The Chess Box for another relatively obscure Bo Diddley treat on our next show. 

And people say we don't know Diddley. Liars!

THE MC5: High School

In fact, I was a high school student when I first heard the MC5. The introduction occurred some time around my senior year, seven or eight years after the 1969 release of the group's incendiary classic "Kick Out The Jams." The track was included on a weird 2-LP various-artists set called Heavy Metal. I wrote about that album here. In that piece, I gave specific praise for the MC5:

"The album opens with 'Kick Out The Jams.' That was the revelation for me. I'd never heard the MC5 before, never heard of the MC5 before. This was the censored version, with brothers and sisters standing in for the unexpurgated original incitement to kick out the jams, muthafuckas. I knew nothing about any of that; I just knew this track rocked, and I discovered its raucous, ragged splendor just before I discovered the concept of punk rock. Within less than a year, I would be an enthusiastic punk fan."

"High School" was my second MC5 track, delivered to my eager ears on July 6, 1979, as I witnessed the Ramones' irresistible film Rock 'n' Roll High School. "High School" was on the movie's soundtrack, but not on the movie's soundtrack album. Within the next two or three years, I tracked down used copies of each of the MC5's three albums, Kick Out The Jams, Back In The USA, and High Time. The Back In The USA track "Shakin' Street" scored a lot--a lot--of turntable time in my apartment in the early '80s.

MC5 guitarist Wayne Kramer left our mortal Shakin' Street behind at the beginning of this month. There was no doubt that we would close this week's show with "Kick Out The Jams," and I confess I was tempted to program the uncensored version for play during the safe harbor period, then sub in the cleaner-language edit for replay. But: Too much work. We kick out the jams in the fashion we choose.

And during our opening set, we chose the MC5's "High School" to salute the late, great Wayne Kramer. The kids want a little action. The kids want a little fun. The kids all have to get their kicks before the evening's done.

It's been a long, long time since high school. The lesson was learned, and it remains in place. Rah rah rah. Sis boom bah.

BLUE ÖYSTER CULT: Godzilla

I associate Blue Öyster Cult's song "Godzilla" with a specific memory of someone I knew decades ago. We were friends, but we did not part as friends. Our eventual estrangement had nothing whatsoever to do with either "Godzilla" or the band that performed it, but my mind tethers the track to a former friend, and my recollection of that friend playing the song and dedicating it to a former flame, someone I didn't really know. 

They also did not part as friends. 

Music is larger than its intrinsic details, and it can affect us in ways far beyond the artists' intentions. For all that, I don't hate the song at all. I do still dig it, and it makes a welcome addition to the TIRnRR playlist. I was amazed to look at our all-time stats and discover we'd never played the damned thing before. Well! There goes Tokyo! Go, go Godzilla!

MAD MONSTER PARTY: No Matter What I Do

When Dana programmed the Blue Öyster Cult song, I couldn't resist following that mad monster Godzilla with Mad Monster Party. Categorical imperative, people. Mad Monster Party included Gwynne Kahn and (at times) Bambi Conway, both of whom had been in the Pandoras, whose way fab 1984 track "It's About Time" merits a chapter in my long-threatened book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1). 

Mad Monster Party released one single and recorded an album's worth of absolutely ace material in the '80s; if the album had come out, it would have been one of my tippy-top records of the decade, probably Top Three (challenging On Fyre by Lyres, falling just short of my # 1 pick Drop Out With The Barracudas). One of its tracks, "Can't Stop Loving You," appeared on This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 3 in 2013, and the whole album (or at least an approximation of it) was briefly available as an authorized digital download. It is no longer available in any legit form.

And that's a shame. I have wav masters of the album, provided to me by the band when we were putting together the above-mentioned TIRnRR compilation. This stuff cries out for wider attention, wider release, and I hope some visionary record label will strike a deal to put Mad Monster Party on the shelves in physical form.

"No Matter What I Do" is from that album, and it rocks. Hey, Godzilla! Wanna party? Mad monsters gotta stick together.

SLADE: Do We Still Do It

Before radio playlists became so numbingly homogenized across the breadth of everywheresville, it was possible--common, even--for Top 40 stations in different parts of the USA to play records not being played in other markets. 

For example:

1970s stompmeisters Slade were huge in their native UK, largely unknown (or at least underappreciated) here in the colonies. But I knew 'em, because Syracuse's WOLF-AM decided Slade's "Gudbye T' Jane" was a goddamned hit, and played the track accordingly. Over time, I eventually snagged the Slade best-of LP Sladest, and sniffed imperiously at Johnnys-come-lately who discovered Slade material through Quiet Riot's meatball covers in the '80s. Poseurs.

For all that, I have to concede that it was an '80s cover version that hooked me on Slade's "Do We Still Do It." Slade's original version appeared on their 1974 album Old New Borrowed And Blue. In 1988, Flashcubes guitarist Paul Armstrong covered the song with his group 1.4.5. on their album Rhythm n' Booze. Thus indoctrinated, I kept ears open for Slade's OG rendition, and finally grabbed a copy of Old New Borrowed And Blue at a record show. We have played the Slade and the 1.4.5. records at various times on this show over the years.

And we still do it.

THE COCKTAIL SLIPPERS: St. Valentine's Day Massacre

The Greatest Record Ever Made!

PAUL COLLINS: I'm The Only One For You

From power pop legend Paul Collins' new album Stand Back And Take A Good Look, "I'm The Only One For You" just might be my favorite new track of 2024 so far. We've now played it three weeks in a row. Spin # 4 will come this Sunday night. Stand back? NO! Dive in, man. Dive in.

THE BROTHERS STEVE: Songwriter

The mighty Brothers Steve released two albums with the good folks at Big Stir Records: # 1 (an independent release in 2019, reissued by Big Stir in 2020) and Dose (2021). If they do another album, I continue to insist it's gotta be called Dry.

I will not explain this joke to you.

Meanwhile, it was high time we played another Brothers Steve number (GET IT?) on the show, and we went back to # 1 for our choices. From that album, "We Got The Hits" has become something of a TIRnRR Fave Rave, so we figured we'd mix it up a bit, deciding between "Beat Generation Poet Turned Assassin" and "Songwriter." We went with the latter.

When it comes to programming the best stuff, you can always count on us.

THE MC5: Kick Out The Jams

Also The Greatest Record Ever Made. Godspeed, Wayne Kramer. Kick out the jams, brother. Kick out the jams.

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

THE GREATEST RECORD EVER MADE: It's About Time

From my long-threatened (and maybe even eventual) book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1).

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

THE PANDORAS: It's About Time

Written by Paula Pierce

Produced by Greg Shaw and Bill Inglot

From the album It's About Time, Voxx Records, 1984

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)

A later line-up of the Pandoras 

Mad Monster Party

Rebel Pebbles

Paula Pierce

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!! https://rarebirdlit.com/gabba-gabba-hey-a-conversation-with-the-ramones-by-carl-cafarelli/

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

10 SONGS: 10/28/2021

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 is the second of two editions of 10 Songs this week. Its predecessor drew exclusively from the playlist for This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio # 1100. This one does not. Instead, each of these ten songs was almost included in our 1100th show, and each was in the playlist at some point as Dana and I compiled it.

THE CATHOLIC GIRLS: Someone New

"Boys Don't Cry" was the first Catholic Girls track I ever heard, courtesy of dat ole debbil MTV. The group's video for "Boys Can Cry" may have been my sole communion with the Catholic Girls' music in the early '80s, though I eventually scarfed up a copy of their eponymous 1982 LP. "Someone New" off that album was definitely my favorite, and it later became the first Catholic Girls track ever played on TIRnRR. (I suspect we may have played the Catholic Girls on our pre-TIRnRR series We're Your Friends For Now in '92, but we have no written records of the playlists for those shows.)

We began corresponding with the Catholic Girls' Gail Peterson in 1992, our first full year on the air and also the year that Renaissance Records reissued the above-cited Catholic Girls album on CD. New Catholic Girls music followed, and we were all in. "Niagara Falls." "Make Me Believe." "Somebody In The USA." "Rock'n America." And of course, our latter-day favorite "Should Have Been Mine," from the Catholic Girls' 2005 album Meet The Catholic Girls. We played 'em all, and more.

Our second This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio compilation CD was supposed to include a Catholic Girls track, but a behind-the-scenes issue (beyond our control, and not the Catholic Girls' fault) prevented that from happening. They forgave us, and let us use "Should Have Been Mine" on 2013's This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 3, the first compilation over which Dana and I had total control of the content.

For TIRnRR # 1100, we opted to go back to that 1982 debut for another spin of "Someone New," but we weren't able to squeeze it in. Damn these unbreakable laws of time and physics. You'll hear it on TIRnRR # 1101 this coming Sunday night.

DOUG DEREK AND THE HOAX: Bobby's Gotta Get Back To Boston [1981 version]

I determined weeks ago that I wanted to open TIRnRR # 1100 with the Brothers Steve's direct statement of intent "We Got The Hits." The track is on the group's Big Stir Records release # 1, and its use at the top of the show prompted Dana to suggest we devote the first set to a few of the labels that have been so good to us. There were more than a mere six likely labels to honor, but we settled on Big Stir, Red On Red, Rainbow Quartz, Rum Bar, Kool Kat Musik, and Jem. Futureman and JAM Recordings were represented elsewhere on the playlist. I regret we didn't get to SpyderPop and Not Lame (among others), but both labels supplied tracks that will be heard on next week's show (the former in its current partnership with Big Stir).

Kool Kat Musik was also a presence throughout our 1100th show, with tracks from our 2017 collection This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4. But we wanted to play at least one Kool Kat track not directly affiliated with us, and I chose Doug Derek and the Hoax with "Bobby's Gotta Bet Back To Boston [1981 version]," from Kool Kat's Doug Derek retrospective Who The Hell Is Doug Derek? "Bobby's Gotta Get Back To Boston" is a fantastic track, but in recording the show, I felt Bill Berry's "1-800-Colonoscopy" (from Kool Kat's 2020 John Wicks tribute album For The Record) was an imperative. It was our # 2 most-played track last year (surpassed only by the Muffs' "On My Own"), we dubbed it "The Love Theme From 2020," and it needed to be represented on TIRnRR # 1100. Yeah, not the first time a colonoscopy disrupted someone's plans.

THE GRIP WEEDS: Rainbow Quartz

Really wanted to include the Grip Weeds in TIRnRR # 1100. New Jersey's phenomenal pop combo has been among our go-to acts here for decades, and they've appeared on two of our TIRnRR compilations ("Out Of Today" on TIRnRR Vol. 2 and "Strange Bird" on TIRnRR Vol. 4). Grip Weeds drummer and lead singer Kurt Reil does appear on our 1100th show playlist as a member of the BAR (with Danny Adlerman and Jim Babjak), but the group's own song "Rainbow Quartz" almost made it in, too. The Grip Weeds have a new all-covers album, DiG, due imminently from the good folks at Jem Records. We'll hear a song from DiG this Sunday night.

MAD MONSTER PARTY: Can't Stop Loving You

For a little mutant radio show, we've done a fair job of providing public services to the rockin' pop public. One of these services was the first (and still only) CD appearance of music by Mad Monster Party, an absolutely incredible but frustratingly obscure all-female SoCal group from the '80s. Mad Monster Party included the fabulous 'n' foxy Gwynne Kahn, ex of the Pandoras, and their then-unreleased tracks are among THE best stuff recorded by anyone in that decade. There was a digital release of the tracks in 2013 (the same year we used "Can't Stop Loving You" on This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 3), but I think even the download option may have faded from the marketplace since then. Mad Monster Party's humble li'l catalog is, in '80s speak, totally awesome, and way, way overdue for physical release. NOW, dammit!! Calling Big Stir! We got a job for you!

THE PARTIES: Cryin' Shame

Here's one of two cases where I picked one song to represent an artist on this week's playlist and then changed to a different song by the same artist. I was taken with the Parties' first album Can't Come Down back in 2008, and granted well-deserved airplay to a song called "Damned By The Sunshine." I was well and truly blown away away by the title track of the group's 2009 Cryin' Shame EP, and this week I picked that song to represent the Rainbow Quartz label in our opening set. But as I thought more about it, "Let's Call It Love" (from the Parties' 2010 album Coast Garde, the group's most recent release as far as I know) was the Parties' biggest hit with TIRnRR listeners. Couldn't go wrong with any of those choices.

POP CO-OP: You Don't Love Me Anymore

And here's the other case of me switching a band's designated song after tentatively settling on a different song. The lads in Pop Co-Op--Steve Stoeckel, Bruce Gordon, Joel Tinnel, and Stacy Carson--give partial credit to TIRnRR for their existence, which makes us as proud as any Frankenstein you're ever likely to meet. 2017 gave us Pop Co-Op's debut album Four State Solution, and it also brought us "You Don't Love Me Anymore," which the band let us use for This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 4. "You Don't Love Me Anymore" reminds me a little bit of both Gerry and the Pacemakers and Chad and Jeremy, but it's accomplished with a trifle more essential oomph than either of those British Invasion stalwarts were generally known to...um, oomphify. Perfect track for TIRnRR # 1100! 

But y'know what? "It Ain't Easy Being A Boy" (from Four State Solution) is also a perfect track for TIRnRR # 1100. So we went that one instead. IT'S ALIVE! POP CO-OP IS ALIVE...!!

THE PRIMITIVES: Crash

Prerecording shows offers the advantage of shuffling choices around to make 'em fit as best they can. Each week, Dana and I set a playlist of seven six-song sets, a final set of eight songs, and another eight bonus tracks that can serve as an add-on eighth set before the final (ninth) set, if there's time. Very often, there isn't time, so the eighth set either shrinks to six songs, or disappears entirely as some of its tracks merge into that final set instead. Show # 1100 didn't have time for the bonus set, so that eighth set of eight songs dropped four songs and folded into what had been the ninth set, creating a set of twelve songs to close the program.

The Primitives' rockin' pop classic "Crash" was one of the casualties. But rest assured: we'll play it again eventually. As we should.

THE SMALL FACES: You Need Loving

"You Need Loving" by the Small Faces was another of the tracks cut in the smooshing together of our two final sets this week. Yeah, this sounds amazingly similar to Led Zeppelin's subsequent monolith "Whole Lotta Love," and both of these tracks sound amazingly similar to Muddy Waters' "You Need Love," which was written by Willie Dixon and well predates your diminutive visages and metallic dirigibles. The Small Faces' track never got much traction, so Willie Dixon knew who was the best target for litigation when he went after Led Zeppelin instead. Gentlemen, start your lawyers!

THE SKELETONS: Trans Am

They were America's coolest band. The Skeletons were something else, especially as a live act, and I regard "Trans Am" as their signature tune. Another one of the four songs cut when the original eighth set combined with the original ninth set. (I don't remember exactly what song was the fourth; I think it was just one of the tracks that got moved around in planning, so either the Catholic Girls or the Grip Weeds).

THE TWEAKERS: Super Secret Mystery Track

In college basketball March Madness parlance, the Tweakers were the last team out. "Super Secret Mystery Track" would have been the final track on this week's playlist, after the farewell and after the Poptarts' "I Won't Let You Let Me Go" (the first track ever played on TIRnRR) and Dana & Carl (with Dave Murray)'s "The Ballad Of Jah Clampett" (from This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 1). We ran outta time. And no, I'm still not gonna tell you anything about the Tweakers. Can't you read? It's a super secret MYSTERY track! Go buy Futureman's digital download of This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio, Volume 3 and hear for yourself. And come on back Sunday night for TIRnRR # 1101. Gotta keep buildin' to our next milestone. Tweak. Tweak. Tweak.

Is this man a Tweaker, or is he the host of Radio Deer Camp on SPARK Syracuse? Or is he...BOTH?!

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This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio with Dana & Carl airs Sunday nights from 9 to Midnight Eastern, on the air in Syracuse at SPARK! WSPJ 103.3 and 93.7 FM, and on the web at http://sparksyracuse.org/ You can read about our history here.

The many fine This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio compilation albums are still available, each full of that rockin' pop sound you crave. A portion of all sales benefit our perpetually cash-strapped community radio project:

Volume 1: download
Volume 2: CD or download
Volume 3: download
Volume 4: CD or download
Waterloo Sunset--Benefit For This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio:  CD or download

I'm on Twitter @CafarelliCarl.