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 # 1310
P. HUX: Hard To Get Over A Heartbreak
The great Parthenon Huxley covering Raspberries? I'm IN! P. Hux's irresistible rendition of "Hard To Get Over A Heartbreak" comes to us via Think Like A Key Music's Play On: A Raspberries Tribute, a simply sublime berry-flavored confection collection masterminded by our old friend Ken Sharp. It's hard to get over how good this is. We'll debut two more Play On cuts on our next show.
THE RAMONES: Surf City
When the Ramones' incredible Rocket To Russia album was released in 1977, someone in the rock press (I don't remember who) proclaimed with great glee, IT'S A JAN AND DEAN ALBUM! True assessment! But it took da Brudders more than 15 years to get around to actually covering your Jan and your Dean on record. That feat was finally accomplished with this righteous 'n' respectful punk rock romp through "Surf City," as heard on the Ramones' 1993 all-covers album Acid Eaters. Two girls for every boy. Well! Jackie and Judy, and Sheena and Ramona, meet Jan and Dean.
STRAWBERRY ALARM CLOCK: Monsters
Who cares what trick-or-treat games we choose? As the eerie glow of jack-o'-lanterns fades in the rearview mirror, and colorful lights of a different season beckon on the horizon, we still wanted to play one more track from Big Stir Records' epic Halloween compilation Chilling, Thrilling Hooks And Haunted Harmonies. With little to gain but nothing to lose, and mindful of a rare opportunity to play something new from Strawberry Alarm Clock, we opted for a post-All Hallow's Eve spin of their TCH&HH track "Monsters." A yardstick for lunatics? Man, that's just one point of view.
And on the subject of Strawberry Alarm Clock, from a previous 10 Songs:
I don't remember if I knew Strawberry Alarm Clock's "Incense And Peppermints" at the time of its 1967 chart reign--I was seven years old, but it's possible--or if I came to embrace the song after the fact. If the latter, I may have heard of the 1970 sexploitation film Beyond The Valley Of The Dolls before I knew "Incense And Peppermint;" I certainly didn't see the movie itself until many, many years later, and I didn't know that Strawberry Alarm Clock appeared in it, but I saw a Beyond The Valley Of The Dolls pictorial in Playboy, and that got my adolescent attention. (What business did a ten-year-old have reading Playboy? The business of staring at unclothed women. Plus articles, I guess.)
But yeah, in addition to the pulchritudinous charms of its actresses, Beyond The Valley Of The Dolls presented Strawberry Alarm Clock in a party scene, lip-syncing their hit from a few years back, and then doing the same with two new songs for the soundtrack LP (as well as pretending to back up the film's fictional combo the Carrie Nations).
Unlike the Carrie Nations, Strawberry Alarm Clock kept their clothes on.
The Crawdaddys covering the Velvet Underground, and Marvin Gaye inspiring the Velvet Underground. I believe Lou Reed acknowledged that his VU song "There She Goes Again" borrowed directly from Gaye's 1962 Motown stalwart "Hitch Hike," as both songs are built on an identical boppin' rhythm that starts 'em and carries 'em. Thumbs out, and thumbs up.
VEGAS WITH RANDOLPH: I Could Be The One
"I Could Be The One" is another past TIRnRR favorite included on Drops Of Gold: The Best Of Vegas With Randolph. We play the hits, and this particular hit has a brand-new animated video that is likewise hit-worthy. GOLD, I tell ya! Gold.
THE GO-GO'S: Surfing And Spying
The Greatest Record Ever Made!
THE KINKS: Juke Box Music
From a previous post:
There are songs for all occasions. The right tune can comfort, console, lift, motivate. It can offer catharsis or escape, band aid or blunt instrument, challenge or confirmation. A time to cast away stones, a time to gather stones together.
Also dancing. Evidence suggests the right song can inspire dancing.
The Kinks' 1977 Sleepwalker album was released just as I was becoming increasingly fascinated by the Kinks. It was the right album at the right time, unencumbered by the larger themes of the group's then-recent series of concept albums, fittingly sprightly and energetic at a time when punk rock was also about to draw my interest. I saw the Kinks perform the album's title track on TV, on both The Mike Douglas Show and NBC's Saturday Night. Each of these home tube appearances was supplemented by older Kinks material--"Celluloid Heroes" on the Douglas show, an exciting medley of "You Really Got Me," "All Day And All Of The Night," "Well Respected Man," and "Lola" on the show soon to be renamed Saturday Night Live--reinforcing the connection between past and present. The Kinks weren't back; they'd never gone away.
I wound up absolutely obsessing over a Sleepwalker album track and single called "Juke Box Music." That song's bouncy saga of a girl who maintains a far-too-literal belief in the lyrics of the songs she loves resonated within my own ongoing conflict of thinking too much versus not thinking nearly enough, taking things too seriously (and being waaaay too thin-skinned) versus developing an elusive emotional and (quasi-) intellectual balance. As a college freshman in the fall of '77, I wrote a short story inspired by my interpretation of "Juke Box Music." It...wasn't very good. But my skills improved over time. It's only juke box scribblin', man.
But it's only meant to dance to, so you shouldn't take it to heart.
Only juke box music. Can anything that captivates us really be reduced to an only? I say no, but I also embrace the need for balance. We can't let passions interfere too much with the task of living our lives in this mundane world. As a slightly later Kinks song tells us, you've gotta live life.
But without our passions, is it really living?
In the spring of '78, I saw the Kinks in concert. "Juke Box Music" was their encore. Right place at the right time. God save serendipity, and God save "Juke Box Music."
ELVIS PRESLEY: Heartbreak Hotel
King Elvis I. From my book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1):
This 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.
THE FLASHCUBES: The Sweet Spot
Syracuse's own power pop powerhouse the Flashcubes, contributing a fab original tune to their own tribute album. As one oughta! In a year of Dow-Jonesian highs and lows, assembling the various-artists blockbuster Make Something Happen! A Tribute To The Flashcubes stands as my proudest work. We have found the sweet spot, and it is ours.
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I compiled a various-artists tribute album called Make Something Happen! A Tribute To The Flashcubes, and it's pretty damned good; you can read about it here and order it here. 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. You can read about our history here.
