10 SONGS: 4/7/2023

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 # 1175. This week's show is available as a podcast.

THE RAMONES: Blitzkrieg Bop

The imminent release of my first book Gabba Gabba Hey! A Conversation With The Ramones inspired me to want to pay further tribute to the Ramones throughout April and May on TIRnRR. In our April shows, we'll be playing my single favorite track from each of the Ramones' fourteen studio albums, in chronological order, four tracks per week. We'll top off our April 23 show with my favorite non-LP Ramones single track and my favorite Ramones soundtrack cut. (And, yeah, as much as I love "I Want You Around," it's no spoiler to admit my top Ramones soundtrack song choice is exactly what you expect it to be.) We'll do the live albums on 4/30, and more Ramones mania will follow in May.

That celebration of my # 1 tracks from each of the Ramones' albums begins this week, with the classic first four: Ramones, Leave Home, Rocket To Russia, and Road To Ruin. And we start with the first track from the first album. "Blitzkrieg Bop" was also the first Ramones song I ever heard, courtesy of my Brockport campus radio station WBSU in the fall of my freshman year 1977. 

As mentioned in yesterday's post, I was 17 in '77, primed for punk by reading Phonograph Record Magazine, aching to claim new and more exciting vistas in my rock 'n' roll. 

That revelation was at hand. "Blitzkrieg Bop" opened the door, setting the stage for another track that would soon knock that door down. Hey-ho. Let's GO!!

NICK PIUNTI: Heart Stops Beating

New music from Nick Piunti is pretty much guaranteed a spin on TIRnRR. Death, taxes, construction on I-81, and spins of new Nick Piunti songs on TIRnRR--see, there are some things in life you can count on.

And for good reason. Nick's stuff is always radio-ready, and his new Jem Records single "Heart Stops Beating" continues that streak of irresistible rockin' pop reliability. Elsewhere in this vast world of radio, "Heart Stops Beating" is also The Coolest Song In The World this week on Little Steven's Underground Garage. 

Rightfully so.

THE RAMONES: Carbona Not Glue

My favorite number on the Ramones' second album Leave Home wasn't even on some folks' copies of Leave Home. Hell, it wasn't on my first copy of Leave Home, though I remedied that sitchyation PDQ. 

Although I think I acquired my Ramones LPs in their proper chronological order--I'm not 100% certain if I picked up Leave Home before or after third album Rocket To Russia, but I do believe I snagged 'em in sequence--the fact that I arrived late to the party meant I got to each individual album after the fact. 1980's End Of The Century was the first Ramones album I bought when it was still a new release. 

By the time I got to 1977's Leave Home some time in (presumably) 1978, the ace track "Carbona Not Glue" had been excised due to threats of legal action from the manufacturers of Carbona Spot Remover. WEASELS! I replaced my incomplete latter-day Leave Home with a used and (fittingly) warped copy of the original issue, and "Carbona Not Glue" instantly became my favorite on the album. 

"Carbona Not Glue" is easily one of my Top Ten Ramones tracks, possibly Top 5. Wondering what I'm doing tonight. It's the goddamned catchiest song about substance I ever did hear. It was finally restored to its proper place on Leave Home when the album was reissued on CD in 2001. Have a heapin' huff of justice served. Take that, weasels!

THE SHIRELLES: Will You Love Me Tomorrow

In retrospect, the Shirelles' "Will You Love Me Tomorrow" seems remarkably mature for a pop hit circa 1960. Sex was a taboo subject on Top 40 radio, with any record approaching an even remotely risqué topic essentially dismissed from airplay consideration. This particular record is about doing it; there is no other plausible interpretation. Its sense of uncertainty, its vulnerability, its contemplation of tonight's ramifications on tomorrow add a weight beyond easy dismissal or censorship. It's about love and passion, passion and love, both in equal parts.

"Will You Love Me Tomorrow" was also the first # 1 hit for its songwriting team, Gerry Goffin and Carole King. King wrote the music, Goffin crafted the lyrics. There is no shortage of irony in the fact that these tender lyrics about intimacy were written by Goffin, who so casually cheated on King throughout their relationship. Tonight the light of loving's in your eyes. Tomorrow's perspective may remain a work in progress.

THE RAMONES: Sheena Is A Punk Rocker

The record that changed my life. I know I've said that a lot, especially lately, because there is just no way for me to talk about "Sheena Is A Punk Rocker" without making that specific reference: The Record That Changed My Life. I heard "Blitzkrieg Bop" first, but listening to the "Sheena" 45 in November of 1977 is where and when it all clicked into place. For me, everything--everything--started in earnest when I heard "Sheena Is A Punk Rocker."

Phonograph Record Magazine. WBSU. A Ramones 45, followed by another Ramones 45 ("Rockaway Beach"), and still another 45 ("Do You Wanna Dance"), all from the Rocket To Russia album. In between scarfin' up "Rockaway Beach" and "Do You Wanna Dance," I saw my first Ramones show, with the Runaways and the Flashcubes. I began to buy the albums, starting with the debut. I picked up Rocket To Russia over Christmas break in 1978. My enthusiasm would continue to grow and grow and grow. 1-2-3-4. PRM and "Blitzkrieg Bop" got my notice. "Sheena Is a Punk Rocker" made me a fan. The American Beatles. The greatest American rock 'n' roll band of all time. I can't imagine my life without the thrill of the Ramones. 

Thank you, Sheena.

BLUE ASH: Jazel Jane

A few of my friends are divided on the merits (or lack thereof) of the recent Amazon Prime TV series Daisy Jones & The Six. The series chronicles the rise and fall of a fictional '70s rock band, and our Fleetwood Mac-inspired Daisy Jones and crew are perhaps the very sort of act that the Ramones were supposed to chase away. But I loved the series, and I also like some of its music. We played this made-for-TV band's engaging "Regret Me" a few week's back, and it returns to the playlist this week.

The soundtrack of the first episode of Daisy Jones & The Six included Blue Ash's "Jazel Jane," from their 1977 album Front Page News. Blue Ash never achieved the massive popularity they deserved, but they were simply wonderful, and their 1973 single "Abracadabra (Have You Seen Her?)" is a legit power pop essential. Any additional exposure for Blue Ash music is a welcome thing indeed, so kudos to the Daisy Jones producers for making it so.

(More coolness points for Daisy Jones & The Six: the series finale included "This Perfect Day" by the Saints--a track that serves as one of the tags for this week's TIRnRR--and Patti Smith's "Dancing Barefoot" was the TV show's theme song. Good taste there, Daisy. Good taste.)  

THE BREAKAWAYS: Walking Out On Love

The Greatest Record Ever Made!

THE SEX PISTOLS: God Save The Queen

Even before I heard "Blitzkrieg Bop," my first direct exposure to punk rock was when Utica's WOUR-FM played "God Save The Queen" by the Sex Pistols. Summer of '77, just a little before tour "Blitzkrieg Bop" entry's photo of 17-year-old me was taken.  That story was told here, and later adapted for use as a chapter in my long-threatened book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1). It remains my hope that Gabba Gabba Hey! A Conversation With The Ramones will help make the GREM! book a reality. 

No future? I am not yet willing to concede that.

THE RAMONES: I Wanna Be Sedated

"She was asleep, sitting up, her head resting on my shoulder. I was in love with her. And I was already in love with the music of the band whose new album was about to be played on the radio. Love and music. Reasonable goals. I just want to have something to do.

"It was October of 1978. Brenda and I had just met, already exchanged I love yous, and were determined to see where that road would lead us next...."

Those were the opening paragraphs of a Love At First Spin piece I had planned to write about the Ramones' fourth album Road To Ruin. I felt the story would have too much overlap with my Love At First Spin tribute to Rocket To Russia, so the Road To Ruin entry will likely remain unfinished. But the facts remain: I first heard Road To Ruin when Rochester's WCMF-FM played it in its entirety, listening as I sat in my dorm suite with my arm around this girl I'd just met and fallen for. Road to ruin? Road to something better.

"I Wanna Be Sedated" stood out immediately, helped in no small part by its superficial resemblance to Alice Cooper's "Elected," transcending that influence with its paradoxical hybrid of a wish to be numbed combined with a full-throttle approach that couldn't be taken down by a flurry of tranquilizer darts. I can't control my fingers, I can't control my brain. Sounds a lot like the act of being smitten. I want it.

LIBRARIANS WITH HICKEYS: Can't Wait 'Till Summer

Man, I love this track. I love it enough to give it the last word in today's Ramones-centric post, and that's (in the immortal words of the Velvelettes) really sayin' somethin'. From Librarians With Hickeys' 2022 album Handclaps & Tambourines, "Can't Wait 'Till Summer" is likely to get significant burn on the ol' TIRnRR playlist in the weeks to come.

In fact, it's even gonna get played again next week. The vast majority of my selections for the April 9 show will come from the Sire Records catalog, in memory of the late Seymour Stein. For my half of the playlist programming, I'll only have four tracks that weren't ever released on Sire. Two of those are brand new (by the Tearaways and Moonlight Parade), and one is by an act (the Flashcubes) who shoulda been on Sire. Dana provides appropriate balance to make it a proper and nonpareil playlist (though he'll also play more than a few Sire gems, too). I have to postpone playing a lot of superb new tracks to accommodate my ideas for the Sire tribute. 

I still made room for Librarians With Hickeys. "Can't Wait 'Till Summer." Man, I love this track. It returns to the airwaves Sunday night, alongside a bunch of noteworthy sides from Sire Records.

Do you remember rock 'n' roll radio? Your refresher course awaits.

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Carl's new book Gabba Gabba Hey! A Conversation With The Ramones is now available for preorder, 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

10 SONGS: 9/9/2021

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 week's edition of 10 Songs draws exclusively from the playlist for This Is Rock 'n' Roll Radio # 1093.

THE BROTHERS STEVE: We Got The Hits

The Brothers Steve say, "We got the hits!" Yes we do, friends. Yes we do. Lemme tell ya 'bout a few of them....

THE CHELSEA CURVE: Inconceivable

Are the gal and guys of the Chelsea Curve really releasing a new single every month? Man, I hate overachievers, mainly because I'm jealous of, y'know, ambition. I forgive 'em quickly because each of these singles has been pretty damned swell, which is why we play them all on the radio. "A Better Way" has been my fave of the lot to date, but "Inconceivable" may give "A Better Way" a run for its overachieving money. Awright. Keep 'em coming, you lot.

GREAT BUILDINGS: Hold On To Something

They'll be there for you. Long before Danny Wilde and Phil Solem found fame as the Rembrandts, they were (wait for it!) friends in an ace early '80s combo called Great Buildings. Their lone major-label LP Apart From The Crowd was released by Columbia in 1981, and it did not ship 'n' sell the units it deserved. I bought the album (prompted by a rave mention in either CREEM or Trouser Press), but didn't really appreciate it until a year or two later. "Hold On To Something" is the album's lead-off track, and it remains a peer to any and all of the greatest rockin' pop tracks from that decade.

KISS: Detroit Rock City

My first KISS record was the Rock And Roll Over album, a high school graduation gift from my sister in 1977. I'm not exactly sure of the subsequent chronology of my KISS acquisitions. Both Love Gun and Destroyer likely came to me via record club purchases, Alive II was a Christmas present from Mom and Dad in December '77, and a beat-up copy of Alive! came from The Record Exchange in Cleveland Heights. I also picked up a very used copy of Hotter Than Hell somewhere in this '77-'78 time frame, establishing my KISS collection through my first year at college. Dressed To Kill came later, a free-with-purchase, get-this-OUTTA-here! used copy scarfed up at Brockport's Main Street Records. Other than Ace Frehley's "New York Groove" 45 and (maybe) a used copy of Dynasty, this was the totality of my personal KISS library until I decided to go back and get 'em all circa 1989.

I'm pretty sure Destroyer was my second KISS album, my first after Rock And Roll Over. I confess that there was never really a KISS album that I loved; with KISS (as with many other acts), I was an individual song guy rather than a whole LP guy. Side Two of Destroyer had "Shout It Out Loud," a track I loved and have proclaimed The Greatest Record Ever Made! But in the '70s, my primary Destroyer go-tos were the first two tracks on Side One, "Detroit Rock City" and "King Of The Night Time World," and then "Shout It Out Loud" on Side Two. I tried to get into the rest of the album, and I would have probably liked "God Of Thunder" without its special effects, but I likely would have been just as good with a four-song Destroyer EP of "Detroit Rock City," "King Of The Night Time World," "Shout It Out Loud," and the hit AM ballad "Beth." I am as a god of thunder made me.

"Detroit Rock City" remains a favorite. Get up, everybody's gonna move their feet, get down, everybody's gonna leave their seat. I avoid getting sucked into arguments about whether or not KISS is power pop; they're not, but honestly, I think some of their songs come closer to my idea of power pop than, say, 20/20 does. 

Your mileage may vary. But look out for that truck ahead.

THE MIRACLES: Going To A Go-Go

I wish. I miss live music, but I'm generally not in any big hurry to mix with crowds nowadays, since crowds almost always include at least some people who are--what's the word?--stupid. I've only attended two live music events since the shutdowns, with a third coming up soon; I'm masked and fully Moderna'd, but...people. I look forward to seeing more shows when it feels appropriate to see more shows. In the mean time, the Miracles have a song to rev us up for our eventual return to that exciting, vibrant environment. Live music! Oh, I wanna go. 

NICK PIUNTI: Heart Inside Your Head

So much fantastic new pop music being released, and so little time to squeeze it into a mere three-hour weekly showcase. Dana and I would start our own radio station, but we've already established that we hate overachievers. Wouldn't wanna contradict ourselves. Nonetheless, Nick Piunti and the Complicated Men are no strangers to TIRnRR airplay--their track "Upper Hand" scored significant spins in 2020--and new single "Heart Inside Your Head" merits attention from all ears, minds, and attention spans. This is a hit record.

OTIS REDDING: You Left The Water Running

I had no idea that Otis Redding's 1967 gem "You Left The Water Running" was originally unreleased, appearing only on an unauthorized 45 in the '70s and finally seeing legit issue in the late '80s. Well, some things are worth waiting for. I knew the song from Rhino Records' Redding box Otis!, which my lovely wife Brenda gave me as a Christmas gift a couple of decades ago. Thanks again, darlin'!

THE ROLLING STONES: Get Off Of My Cloud

"Get Off Of My Cloud" is the first Rolling Stones song I remember hearing, a hit on the radio in 1965, when I was five years old. In memory of the late Charlie Watts (whose distinctive drum intro to this song means Charlie was the first individual Rolling Stone I ever heard), this is The Greatest Record Ever Made!

THE BOB SEGER SYSTEM: 2 + 2 = ?

An infinite number of songs can each be THE greatest record ever made, as long as they take turns. Even with an infinite number, though, some turns are perhaps less likely than others.

Some may be surprised that Bob Seger gets two chapters in my long-threatened book The Greatest Record Ever Made! (Volume 1). I have given frequent public testimonial regarding how much I despise much of Seger's most popular work, and indeed a GREM! chapter about "Old Time Rock & Roll" is mostly about how much I hate that goddamned song. 

But for all that, a lot of Seger's earlier work is fantastic. Let's have a peek at a little bit of the book's chapter about "2 + 2 = ?"

"Maybe you never knew that Bob Seger made a punk record. If you didn't know, it's not your fault; neither music history nor Seger himself has seemed interested in the secret revelation of a dynamic, furious 1968 record called '2 + 2 = ?'

"It's a difficult dichotomy to reconcile. Seger's mass-market reputation is built largely upon a series of popular mid-tempo heartland ballads and MOR rockers, beloved by many, despised by others. They are soundtracks for truck commercials, banal and inoffensive radio fare with the bland personality of margarine. Even as I type that, I really don't mean any disrespect to those who love 'Like A Rock' or 'Against The Wind' or even--shudder--'We've Got Tonight' and 'Old Time Rock & Roll.' There are no guilty pleasures in pop music. If you like something, a guy writing dismissively about your familiar favorites is unlikely to alter your tastes, nor should it. Dig what you wanna dig. Just, y'know, forgive me for cringing when I hear any of that stuff. I have to dig what I wanna dig, too...

"...It can be galling to admit when you've been wrong. In this case, I comfort myself with a reminder that I still loathe the songs that made me critical of Seger's work to begin with, and (more importantly) that it's good to discover a redemptive portion of an artist's body of work. Seger's supposed to be a good guy; I'm happy to find concrete evidence that he made some records that I can love without reservation. Some of this has since been reissued on a 2018 collection called Heavy Music: The Complete Cameo Recordings 1966-1967. All of it remains relatively obscure.

"...'Get Out Of Denver' had been far and away my favorite among Seger's records. I also kinda liked 'Hollywood Nights' among the more famous choices. But this fresh treasure trove of archival nuggets introduced me to new favorites, recorded and originally released under the names Bob Seger & the Last Heard, the Bob Seger System, and Bob Seger solo. 'Noah.' 'Rosalie.' 'Lucifer.' Renewed spins of the still-great 'Get Out Of Denver' and the now-welcome 'Heavy Music (Part 1).' Rockin', man. And there was the immense, irresistible 'East Side Story,' a triumphant appropriation of Van Morrison's 'Gloria' riff in service of a tenement tragedy that was absolutely The Greatest Record Ever Made for the approximately two and a half minutes of my first spin of its cantankerous glory.

"'2 + 2 = ?' is even greater...

"...How did this happen? How could the Bob Seger of the wretched peacenik-baiting diatribe 'Ballad Of The Yellow Beret' also be responsible for the gooseflesh-raising intensity of the antiwar '2 + 2 = ?' And how did that guy go on to produce such mundane background noise to such numbingly popular effect? Seger's large. He contains multitudes. 

"But the multitudes need to hear '2 + 2 = ?' It's at least as savage as the Sex Pistols, as angry as the Clash, as explosive as the Stooges or the MC5. Never mind the bollocks, here's Bob Seger. Seger is a punk rocker."

THE SPEED OF SOUND: Tomorrow's World

Museum Of Tomorrow, the new album from Manchester's phenomenal pop combo the Speed of Sound, will be released by Big Stir Records on September 17th. It's very, very good. Very good. Find out more here, and get your wallet out. They got the hits. Tomorrow is coming atcha at the speed of sound.

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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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