#pick it up! ska in the 90's

[mtonino]

Domani apro le danze a suon di #ska con brani tratti da due documentari entrambi disponibili gratuitamente online:

This is Ska (1964)

Pick it up! ska in the 90's (2019)

Ore 7.00 su Radio Quar

[theindyreview]

Banger of the Week: It Gets Worse - Big Deal

Banger of the Week: @ItGetsWorseSka - Big Deal A rip-roaring, anthemic ska punk track to get your inner child skanking #newmusic #ska #skapunk #poppunk #ItGetsWorse #BigDeal

It’s not easy being a ska band. You got more mouths to feed (especially if you have a horn section), you’re still fighting the unfair reputation the genre got in the late 90’s, and you’re not exactly getting picked up on the major streaming playlists. But damn it, we need ska bands. Fun ska bands like It Gets Worse, who make jubilant, bouncy songs like “Big Deal”. Songs that are filled with big…

[emersonlogan]

                                     ᴇᴍᴇʀsᴏɴ ʟ��ᴇ ʟᴏɢᴀɴ

                  son333333333333333333lol (eighteen 3′s) on aol.

NICKNAMES: Sonny, Captain Logan (self-anointed since kindergarten). BIRTHDAY: ♋︎ July 3rd, 1979. ♋︎ LIVING ARRANGEMENTS: tba! OCCUPATION: Cafe Worker at Blossom Records. EDUCATION: Freshman at CCU, majoring in Maritime Engineering. HOBBIES/HABITS: Skateboarding. Wandering, exploring secluded areas (finding a hidden cove at the farthest end of the beach or a creek in the woods, sneaking into abandoned buildings, getting mugged in a dark alleyway). Doodling dumb little cartoons. Music festivals & raves. Embellishing stories about wild things that happened at the aforementioned music festivals and raves. Superstitious rituals. Camping. Picking an awful lot of fights for a kid who weighs about 150 lbs. LIKES: Tony Hawk. Boats. Post-rock, neo-psychedelic, hardcore, ska punk, and any alternative or experimental rock music of the ’90s. Skateparks. Treating places he certainly should not skate in like skateparks. 25¢ vending machine knick-knacks. Seagulls (feeding, imitating, chasing, having full one-sided conversations with). Mentos-diet coke rockets. Anchovies. Bonfires, s’mores, ghost stories. Newspaper comics. Play Station. Souvenir culture. Making the Teller sisters smile. :) DISLIKES: Shutting the fuck up about San Francisco. Quietly sitting still, not drumming on any surfaces or disruptively shaking his leg. Staring at a screen for longer than thirty minutes. Clothes that fit less than two sizes too large. Cops. Class. Coffee. Dave Matthews Band. That condescending fake laugh Elaine does when she’s making fun of someone. 

                                                SECRET. When Sonny knew he needed cash if he was going to go through with his plan to run away, he stole an envelope of money that the Freese family had spent years saving up to pay for recent renovations to the ice cream shop. He knew he would’ve had a clearer conscience if he tried to steal some funds from richer families like the Archers, and he knew the Freeses would spend years paying it back and recovering from the bad PR around town — and it seems like they’re still trying to bounce back to this day. But, he also knew the softhearted Scott would be the easiest to take advantage of— the most likely man in town to trust his daughter’s friends around his money, not suspect Sonny, not pursue the burglar, and lay down and take it when he lost his money. He stole the cash with enough buffer time for the heat to die down before he finally left Cherry, and gave the bulk of it to Odessa to cover the expenses of moving him into her home.

                                             BIOGRAPHY.

Class clown. Ne’er-do-well. No-good loud-mouthed hyper-active smartass who needs to wear his helmet with that damn skateboard. Sonny was always the court jester of the school. He would thumb his nose at figures of authority — including the more popular and powerful members of his own friend group. Though it was much more playful and harmless in the case of someone like Harvey, he showed a pretty open disdain toward people like Lux or Elaine, for one reason: he mostly liked or disliked people based on how they treated his high-strung and haunted twin sister, Libby Logan.

No one needs to be reminded that things were always tense in the Logan household, but Sonny never made it easier for anyone. He didn’t have the complacency to watch the mistreatment of his sisters. An early childhood friendship with a spitfire like Zahra Jackson inspired him to stand up for himself, and he had a lifelong habit of talking back and keeping Glenda in a wrathful mood. 

His relationship with Sabrina was always volatile, his feelings towards her fluctuating between aggrievement and compassion depending on how cruel or doting Glenda was towards her on that given day, but it was ultimately loving. He would just never be as close to her, or anyone else, as he was with Libby. 

He took his role as the older twin, only brother, and bravest, most wicked-gnarly and badass rebel in the family to play the hero for his sisters, jumping in front of bullets whenever he could, using his own brazenness for good. If Libby got a bad grade on an art project, he would skateboard through the house and break a lava lamp to make sure his mom’s rage was focused on him more than her. He would try to take the fall for Libby setting off the smoke alarm, and reason that he was going to get in trouble for something bad he did that day anyway, so there was no reason for both of them to suffer. 

At school, he embellished stories or outright made some up to make his mother’s treatment of him sound more funny than tragic. Pushing real facts into the absurdity, going from “my mom makes me wear a leash when she brings me to the grocery store??” in 1st grade to “my mom makes me sleep in a doghouse when I’m bad” in 4th grade, to “my mom slipped dog tranquilizers into my oatmeal because I’m too hyperactive” by middle school. It was impossible to tell how much was made up, or if there were any crumbs of truth to his stories, but they seemed too crazy to be real. By all accounts, he seemed to have a good sense of humor about his mom’s strict parenting and convinced himself and almost everyone else (barring Libby, probably) that he wasn’t genuinely hurt by his home life. 

Unexpectedly, the one person who seemed to immediately notice the toxicity of Sonny and Glenda’s relationship was his mysterious estranged Aunt Odessa, who made a rare, standoffish appearance at a family function when he was in 7th grade, and could tell after witnessing a small blow-up in the corner of the room that this kid was NOT going to survive in Glenda’s house with his stubborn, feisty, tactless spirit. Before making her Irish goodbye, she pulled him to the side and gave him her contact information if he ever needed to talk. She never extended the courtesy to Sabrina or Sabrina’s mini-me, Libby, almost as if it was too painful to even look at them.

For the next year, Sonny would make offhanded jokes to his friend group about running away someday (it runs in his family!), but it never seemed like he was seriously working out logistics of an escape route.

Deep down, even he didn’t realize that he was sincerely considering it, but that may have been out of a fear and denial of how conniving some of his plans were to disappear, and a refusal to believe he actually had it in him to do what he had to do to get away with it. 

Sonny knew that it was a stretch for a 14-year-old to expect a modest, aloof woman to spontaneously adopt him and take on all of the expenses that come with making space for a rambunctious teenage boy in her house, and he also knew that he would need some kind of insurance if he was going to survive on the streets for long enough to make his next move if she didn’t let him in. To soften the blow in either outcome, he needed money. And, tragically, he knew where to get it if he wanted to pull his escape plan off without a hitch.

In the Spring before their freshman year of high school, the Freeses had finally saved up the huge funds they needed to get much-needed renovations done on the ice cream shop, and they left an envelop of money behind the counter in the shop overnight to pay the contractors that would be there in the morning - a shop that that infamously had a busted lock they didn’t rush to replace because they had enough trust in their neighbors.

Sonny’s moral compass knew if he was going to do what he was thinking to do, he could’ve taken from the pockets of a richer family, like the Archers or the Hargroves. But the realistic and frantically desperate side of him knew that the Freeses were the least likely to actually track him down and persecute him. The plan felt like an intrusive thought he wanted to swat away, but on an evening that he came home twenty minutes past curfew to find that Glenda had locked the doors and windows for the night, allegedly assuming he was sleeping over a friend’s, he impulsively skated to Frost-ee’s notoriously unreliably-locked doors and swiped the envelop of cold cash, and spent the rest of the restless, paranoid night sleeping over Cristiano’s. 

Over the course of the springtime and into the Summer, he watched as the Freeses not only went into debt with the renovation team, but also had their local reputation damaged in a way that would impact business in the long term, because so many townies would know them as the scumbag scammers who tried to get free service and lied about the money going missing. 

Sonny stayed in town for the rest of the Summer after it happened, waiting for the scandal to die down a bit before he took off, so people wouldn’t immediately realize it was him. 

The longer he stayed, too scared to say anything about what he did out of fear of the consequences, the more he realized he was completely locked into this plan and there was no turning back. His relationship with the gang would be unsalvageable if they ever found out what he did, (to the Freeses, of all families!) and then he would lose the only reason he had to stay in Cherry. If he managed to hide that he did it, he would be too wracked with guilt to act normal. So, as far as he was concerned, one impulsive move messed up everything he had to live for in Cherry, and his only option was starting a new life somewhere else.

The one person he let in on his scheme to run away was Libby, though he never said a word about the envelope. He only pitched it to her because he wanted her to skip town with him, because she was the one person he thought he could never leave behind. 

She didn’t take it well. She said she would hate him forever if he left, and never talk to him again if he really did it. He convinced himself it was typical Libby Lou dramatics and thought that she would eventually follow him once she realized he was serious about leaving. 

On a muggy August night, he made his move. 

He left instructions for Libby on how to find him, and contact information so he could guide her along the way, but it turned out that she was making good on her promise to never speak to him again. The longer he waited for her to call or show up, the more he started to resent her for, in his mind, choosing Glendzilla over her twin brother.

He pushed forward with making a life in San Francisco, and it became a bastion of freedom for him. He had a surprisingly smooth proposition and move-in with Odessa and her longtime partner, Levi. 

Granted, Odessa was distant — more like a wise older roommate than a caretaker. Though she did everything she could to materially help Sonny, and felt like helping him would make up for abandoning Sabrina, she’ll always be haunted by what happened to her in Cherry, and it was hard to let her walls down around someone who had the same big green eyes as her daughter. She was hands-off in parenting him, since he was already clearly a pretty scrappy and independent kid by the time he got to her, and she never really got a chance to mentally prepare for raising a child, much less one who already came with such a strong personality. 

He spent a lot of time at Bay Area punk shows and music festivals, and stayed out late on school nights. Odessa could tell that he reveled in freedom after a childhood under Glenda’s roof, so she didn’t really have the heart to give him a curfew, and would just do her best to advise him on avoiding hangovers, addictions, and STDs. 

He felt happy with his new life in San Fransisco. He miraculously finished high school and got a job he loved working on the local docks. He thought he made peace with never returning to his hometown, until he got a letter in the mail straight from Cherry, California. And it wasn’t Libby finally reaching out to him. It was Lux, dead and more menacing than ever.

(Christ alive this is getting so stupidly long. You get the gist. He’s back in town in the interest of clearing Libby’s name. He knows there’s hard feelings and he feels awkward for the first time in his life. He enrolled in CCU to have an excuse to stay in town long enough to solve the mystery in the event that his old friends and sisters make it clear that he isn’t welcome. He got a job at the Blossom Records cafe to get closer to Mac. I’ll see you all on the dash.)

                                              PERSONALITY.

Before his houdini act, he was known as the loudmouthed comic relief type of kid who, by all accounts, really seemed to have a heart of gold. He was always quick to reach out to people when they were going through something, but not at all in a Francesca Freese way. He wasn’t qualified to give advice or react seriously to people’s problems. His specialty was, fittingly, escapism. He lived in a house where there was no leveling with his parents or fixing any his family’s problems, so the only way to survive them was to just walk away every once in a while and look outside of his house to find some kind of solace in life. He went into other people’s problems with that same strategy.

Growing up by the coast, in a restrictive household, he always romanticized sailors and pirates, and dreamed of being the captain of his own ship, far away from society’s dumb rules and stressors. Everyone knew he was planning to travel the seven seas when he grew up, but nobody guessed that he would make his maiden voyage at the age of 14.

He has a lifelong habit of wandering off without telling anyone, and is a survivor of child leashing, which only ended when Glenda got tired of him trying to escape and opted to let him roam free and simply never tell him she loved him ever again. On more than one occasion, Sonny almost caused traffic pileups from crossing the road without looking both ways as a child. He kept every lifeguard in Cherry in the early ’90s busy. He could not be trusted around a “Keep off the Grass” or “No Trespassing” sign.

Sonny has always loved the idea of exploring, travelling, and going on adventures. He’s a devotee of souvenir culture, even on extremely small scales. If he went to the beach without Cristiano, he would bring back the coolest seashell he found that day. If he went to the grocery store without his sisters, he would stop at the 25¢ vending machines and get a glittery little bouncy ball for Libby and a plastic butterfly ring for Sabrina. (I have a list of worthless little presents he’s given every member of the gang + some lifelong townies that I’ll probably post soon!!)

100% Sonny was the kid who hid these little trinkets in your coat pockets for you to find the next time you wore it, and he would also just mess with stuff in your room, so you would be getting ready for bed the night after he visited and see he positioned your G.I. Joes to be 69ing. He’d leave secret messages in the last few pages of your notebooks that you wouldn’t find until you got to that page in the last month of school. More than one of the gang members absolutely ended their freshman year of high school finding a crude doodle in the back of their math notebook of a duck in a pirate hat smoking a cigarette, with a caption that said ‘CAPTAIN LOGAN WUZ X.’ 

He’s hugely sentimental. Even in his skeleton’s connections, it’s loud and clear that he’s still impacted by the end of his friendships with Zahra and Cristiano. It’s fair to say that he never stopped thinking about the gang while he was in San Francisco. He still seems to remember the tiniest, dumbest details and anecdotes about everyone and can’t help the big bittersweet smile on his face when he’s reminiscing about them. 

He picked up some bohemian lifestyle choices from spending time with hippie layabouts back in San Fransisco. He’s allegedly tried a wide array of psychedelic drugs, reads Adbusters, plays the bongos, likes the idea of liking the Beat poets and Hunter S. Thompson, and suddenly understands Astrid Van Allen’s lectures better than ever after dating an archetypal 90′s Wicca girl in high school. At his core, he’s still an unserious chucklefuck who loves Adam Sandler movies, but he’ll supportively nod along to Casey’s rants about the government and interpretations of Camus.

                                           HEADCANONS.

Did not like Lux Lewis, mostly out of loyalty to Libby. His relationships with the other popular girl side of the group (Alice, Elaine, Kitty, Virginia, Zahra) fluctuated, but I think he really chalked up most of their worst personality traits to Lux rubbing off on them. (Elaine stayed on thin ice at all times though.) He got along best with the group members who were the right mix of weird/offbeat/alternative and outgoing (Cristiano, Casey, Rocky, Frankie). He still tried to dick around with the quieter friends like Noah, Rory, Mac, and Zev, but as much as he admired them, I think his loud personality might have been overwhelming to them and he might have felt like he was pulling teeth trying to drag them out of their shells. (I don’t think Mac fits neatly into the latter group but their connection requires that they weren’t that close in their childhood so I’m lumping him in there.) His relationship with Harvey was it’s own bag of mixed but generally positive feelings; he definitely had more good will toward Harvey than the cheerleaders thanks to his friendship with Libby, but a part of Sonny did resent him, unfairly, solely for the fact that Glenda always tried to morph him into Harvey’s clone.) 

Sonny was the skatepark rapscallion who taught Libby how to shred!!!!! (as mentioned in the Sports section of her bio.) 

He left Cherry before everybody’s shit hit the fan after middle school, so he doesn’t know anything about things like Rocky or Virginia moving to the Southside, or Alice falling from grace.

I’ve fully decided he had a big fat crush on Maddie when he was little. She was an aspirational figure to him, as someone who traveled across the country every year and had this worldly adventurer’s mystique in Sonny’s eyes, but more importantly, she was very nice, and pretty, and matched his goofy energy, and he thought that her being kind of tomboyish made her the coolest girl he’d ever met. I don’t think she had the ability to make him shy, per se, but I’ll bet that any time she said something vaguely approving toward him he got tongue-tied and suddenly couldn’t keep eye contact.

You may have noticed that he’s listed as 21 and Libby is listed as 20 on the skeletons page... 👀 Hmmm............... ...................Anyway.

TW: DIS0RDERED EATING ! He has some hang-ups and weird habits with regards to eating, from a childhood of Glenda denying or tampering with his food for punishments. He used to survive mostly on sealed 7-Eleven snacks, and to this day he still avoids eat homemade meals or restaurant food. You’ll mostly catch him eating tinned sardines, crackers, beans, and bagged spinach. He also has a deeply-ingrained habit of starving himself when he feels really guilty and is compelled to punish himself to ease his conscience. 😔 He doesn’t know how much a victim he is to the Catholic mentality Glenda injected into his brain that Suffering = Virtuous.

UH OH!! I accidentally decided it would be really angsty and fun if he convinced everybody to participate in a time capsule and he invited everyone to bury it in his favorite piece of beach to celebrate their middle school graduation. Perhaps we... could all pitch ideas for what our characters threw in there.   

                           WANTED CONNECTIONS!!!!!!!!!!!!

I want to say that he made sure to have one last one-on-one hangout with every member of the gang in the month before he blew this pop stand. I like the drama of him having one unforgettable day with each of his friends, even though there would be a tension hanging over his head the whole time, because they would think that they were going to continue this great friendship with him in high school, while he knew it was supposed to be the last time he would ever see them. I would love to plot these out with everybody pleeeeease. :) (Don’t actually feel pressured though. I’m gonna say he reached out to make plans with everyone - even Elaine the Pain - but they didn’t have to actually indulge him.)

Roommate(s)?? His living arrangements are up in the air right now!! Not sure if he’d be dorming through loans or if he would want to save as much money as possible by living off-campus. If anyone has a character or family that would’ve posted a tenant wanted listing over the Summer, or needs a dorm-buddy, lmk! <3 He could be on the Southside or Cherry Proper, but it would probably have to be a very humble apartment if he’s in the mainland. 

There are some wanted connections mentioned in the interview section on his app! The friend he had his first drink with, the girl whose hand he held (could be upgrade to a very awkward smooch or honestly might’ve been completely chaste and just him trying to cheer her up when she was sad as opposed to it being a romantic thing if that doesn’t fit!, the older kid who gave Sonny dirty magazines in exchange for letting him into Sabrina’s underwear drawer wait not that one), or any other first-time memories. I had some muses in mind when writing those anecdotes, but I didn’t mention any names because I wanted to leave them open to anyone or make the characters inconsequential NPCs. (EDIT: i just revisited the app and realized I actually cut out all but two of those anecdotes from my original draft because otherwise Sonny would’ve been rambling for like twenty minutes, but the other ideas that involved other muses were: first time someone actually got him to focus and study for a test without any distractions, first time seeing a shooting star while looking at the sky with someone, first time he threw a punch, first time playing spin the bottle or truth or dare, first bicurious confession or homoerotic experience. :0 )

I just want to secure a childhood Play Station buddy. You know Glenda would never let him play Mortal Kombat under her roof but I feel like he needs to have that essential 90s tweenage boy experience. Who did he have Red Bull-fueled all-nighter sleepovers with. Who is he gonna have a Twisted Metal rematch with? Maybe they would listen to CDs with Parental Advisory Stickers on them or would go to the Blockbuster and rent R-rated movies together (even though Sonny can’t make it five minutes into a movie before he starts yapping or gets restless and suggests they take a 3am walk to 7-Eleven to get snacks and draw dicks on stopsigns). 

When I mentioned in the Logan Fam plotting session that, between being the only son in the family, and having an absentee father and a much-too-present mother, Sonny has some hangups on masculinity and didn’t really have a father/older brother figure in his life, I realize that B was probably joking when she said that “any time sonny had some sort of boy problem, sabrina would drag west to him by the ear like “FIX IT!!”” But. T. Hear me out—  

[morethanmuses]

Ten Women Inclusive Bands To Check Out This International Women’s Day.

This list is for those of you who want to discover some more modern, punk/alternative bands with women at the helm! Here are ten of our picks (in no particular order).

1. Meet Me @ The Altar

Formed remotely in 2015 after the girls met online, Edith Johnson (vocals), Téa Campbell (guitar) and Ada Juarez (drums) recently signed to Fueled By Ramen after gaining attention online in 2020. They are teasing new music in follow up to their 2019 EP ‘Bigger Than Me’ and their 2020 singles ‘May The Odds Be In Your Favor’ and ‘Garden’. They offer some much needed representation for black and brown girls in the more mainstream alternative scene and hopefully they will help open the door to more recognition for WOC in these genres.

Spotify

Our favourite track(s): Beyond My Control, Tyranny, Garden, May The Odds Be In Your Favour, Caught In The Middle (Paramore cover).

2. Stand Atlantic

While they have been a band in some form since 2012, Australia’s Stand Atlantic began going by the name in 2014. They’ve gained steady momentum since releasing their debut EP ‘Sidewinder’ in 2017, touring with the likes of New Found Glory and State Champs, quickly making a name for themselves in their own right. Their relatable, down to earth approach to social media has helped garner them a faithful fanbase, along with the stellar debut album ‘Skinny Dipping’ (2018) and sophomore album ‘Pink Elephant’ (2020).

Spotify

Our favourite track(s): Push, Lost My Cool, Hate Me (Sometimes), Drink To Drown, Your Graduation (Modern Baseball cover), Righteous (Juice WRLD cover).

3. Meg & Dia

Sisters Meg (guitar) and Dia (vocals) Frampton have been playing music together since they were children. In 2004, they began writing original music together under the name Meg & Dia. They released their debut acoustic album ‘Our Home Is Gone’ in 2005. They reworked some of these tracks for their album ‘Something Real’, having recruited a full band to fill out their sound. They enjoyed popularity on MySpace, especially with their single ‘Monster’, and consequently played Warped Tour in 2006. Over the years they have explored many genres within their music, combining rock with folk, indie, and most recently pop. After a break in 2012 in which Dia pursued her solo career, she was a contestant on (and almost won) The Voice US. In 2019, the girls reformed to play the final Warped Tour, and released their fifth album ‘happysad’.

Spotify

Our favourite track(s): Monster, Inside My Head, Dreams Like Oceans, The Broken Ones (Dia Frampton solo), Teenagers.

4. Sonic Boom Six

Fronted by Laila Khan (Laila K) and Paul Barnes (Barney Boom) Sonic Boom Six formed in 2002 in Manchester, UK. Blending punk, ska, grime and hip hop with lyrics focusing on social commentary to challenge issues such as racism and sexism. Known for their energetic live shows, the band has a strong underground following, and have played festivals such as 2000 trees and Warped Tour. Their single ‘For The Kids Of The Multiculture’ was featured in the video game ‘The Sims 3′ expansion pack ‘Showtime’.

Spotify

Our favourite track(s): Monkey See Monkey Do, While You Were Sleeping, Meanwhile Back In The Real World, Virus, From the Fire to the Frying Pan.

5. Hot Milk

Another export of Manchester, Hot Milk began releasing music in 2019 with their debut EP ‘Are You Feeling Alive?’. Fronted by Hannah Mee and Jim Shaw, who both share vocal and guitar duties, they don’t want to be confined to any one genre and prefer having the freedom to write whatever they feel like. They have supported the likes of Foo Fighters, as well as playing Download, Slam Dunk and Reading & Leeds festivals. Mee has also spoken openly about her sexuality, and is currently in a relationship with Bonnie of Stand Atlantic.

Spotify

Our favourite track(s): June Gloom, Candy Coated Lie$, Awful Ever After, California’s Burning.

6. The Skints

Formed in 2004 in London, The Skints are a reggae punk (or ‘tropical punk’ as they describe themselves) band. Vocal duties are often traded between multi-instrumentalist Marcia Richards, guitarist Joshua Waters Rudge and drummer Jamie Kyriakides. Marcia will keep audiences guessing what new instrument she might play from song to song. Onstage - on top of vocals - she plays guitar, keyboards, sampler, melodica, flute and alto saxophone. Their fourth studio album ‘Swimming Lessons’ (2019) reached number one on the Billboard reggae chart. The band have played with the likes of You Me At Six, Mayday Parade and NOFX. They have never signed with a major label, prefering one-time licensing with independent labels in order to retain creative control over their music.

Spotify

Our favourite track(s): Just Can’t Take No More, Where Did You Go?, Let’s Stay Together - Live at Electric Brixton (Al Green cover), Learning to Swim.

7. Courage My Love / Softcult

Courage My Love are a Canadian band formed in 2009 by twin sisters Mercedes (vocals, guitar) and Phoenix (drums) Arn-Horn and joined by Brandon Lockwood (bass) in 2013. Early releases were pop punk/alternative rock, but the band has transitioned to a more synthpop sound on later releases. Their EP ‘Becoming’ was nominated for Breakthrough Group of the Year at the JUNO Awards. They later re-released ‘Becoming’ as a full album in 2015. Phoenix self-produced their latest EP ‘Spectra’. During 2020, Mercedes and Phoenix began making music under the side project ‘Softcult’ which has a grungier sound.

Spotify

Our favourite track(s): Kerosene, You Don’t Know How, Stereo, Original, Everybody’s Lonely, Another Bish (Softcult).

8. Mint Green

Mint Green are an indie/punk band from Boston. Founded by frontwoman Ronnica and drummer Daniel, the pair are joined by bassist Tiffany and guitarist Brandon. They released their debut EP ‘Growth’ in 2016 and continue to grow a dedicated fanbase through their live shows and outspoken social media presence.

Spotify

Bandcamp

Our favourite track(s): Take Care, Callie, Changing, Motion Sickness (Phoebe Bridgers cover), Adore You (Harry Styles cover).

9. Pinkshift

Baltimore based Pinkshift began releasing music in 2020 and have quickly gained popularity. Inspired by 90s grunge and 2000s pop punk, they pull from various individual influences and combine them with their shared love of angsty rock. The band consists of Ashrita Kumar (vocals), Paul Vallejo (guitar), Myron Houngbedji (drums) and Erich Weinroth (bass).

Spotify

Our favourite track(s): Rainwalk, Toro, On Thin Ice, i’m gonna tell my therapist on you.

10. Forever Emerald

Forever Emerald are a pop rock band from Los Angeles. The band consists of vocalist Devin Papadol, guitarist Brodie Higgs and bassist Tay Fischer. They released their debut EP ‘Safer Space’ in 2019, and while lockdown may have stopped them from touring, they have continued to provide fans with livestream gigs and teasers from the studio where they’re working on new music.

Spotify

Our favourite track(s): Candy, Safer Space, So Sure.

[stevieville]

IMDb: Pick It Up! - Ska in the '90s

This is a good doc. #PepperyHorns

[lethal-liability]

Info Dump Time!

So it has come to my attention that the slasher fandom has recently been introduced to Ice Nine Kills, my favorite band (aside from Rammstein, of course). So if you are really wanting to get into them but have no clue where to start, look no further! As I am about to impart my knowledge onto all of you lovely people!

So Ice Nine Kills is an American Rock band from Boston, Massachusetts (but they like to say they’re from Salem). The band was formed in 2002 by high school friends Spencer Charnas and Jeremy Schwartz, though today the only surviving member of the original band is Spencer.

(more under the cut)

The current members are:

Spencer Charnas - lead vocals (main stage character: Freddy Kruger, Jason Vorhees)

Ricky Armellino - rhythm guitar, co-vocals (the extra screaming voice in most songs lol) (main stage character: Georgie)

Patrick Galante - drums (main stage character: Jigsaw)

Joe Occhiuti - bass, keyboard (Main stage character: Eric Draven)

Dan Sugarman - lead guitar, backing vocals (Main stage character: Leatherface)

Justin “JD” DeBlieck is also technically a current member but he's been on hiatus from the band since Warped Tour 2018. His role in the band has been filled in by Ricky since then.

Their original sound was more ska-punk but have, since their first official album, have changed their sound to metalcore, or as Spencer calls it, theatricore.

Their discography is as follows:

Last Chance To Make Amends - 2006 (not currently on spotify and the only one I haven’t heard)

The Burning - 2007

2 Song Acoustic - 2009

Safe Is Just A Shadow - 2010

The Predator - 2013

The Predator Becomes The Prey - 2014

Every Trick In The Book - 2015

The Silver Scream - 2018

Other notable releases:

They’ve been featured on Punk Goes Pop three times and Punk Goes 90s once. They covered Adele’s Someone Like You on Vol. 5, Maroon 5’s Animals on Vol. 6, Taylor Swift’s I Don’t Want To Live Forever on Vol. 7, and Green Day’s Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life) on Punk Goes 90’s Vol. 2 (also, side note, Motionless In White covered Rammstein’s Du Hast on that record and it is *chef kiss* horrible. Awful. Listen to it if you wanna ruin your ears. Chris Motionless does not know a lick of German and it shows)

In 2017 they released a re-recorded version of Safe Is Just A Shadow which I personally prefer over the original because it is a much cleaner record. I also like that it only features Spencer’s vocals which I find sounds much better than the mix of his and former bassist Shane Bisnett’s vocals.

Last year, they released a deluxe version of The Silver Scream which includes the new track Your Number’s Up, a cover of Michael Jackson’s Thriller, and acoustic versions of A Grave Mistake, Stabbing In The Dark, SAVAGES, and Thank God It’s Friday (personally I only really like the acoustic of A Grave Mistake)

Their two most recent albums, Every Trick In The Book and The Silver Scream follow a similar format where every song on them follows a similar theme, ETITB being all based on classic novels and TSS being all based on slasher movies (with the exception of Thriller).

The songs and what they’re based on are as follows:

The Nature Of The Beast - Animal Farm by George Orwell

Communion Of The Cursed - The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty

Bloodbath & Beyond - Dracula by Bram Stoker

The Plot Sickens - Alive: The Story of The Andes Survivors by Piers Paul Read

Star-Crossed Enemies - Romeo And Juliet by William Shakespeare (the analyst in me really loves this song because it implies that Romeo and Juliet knew that they were only characters in a play but died together anyway because they knew they couldn’t escape their fate)

Me, Myself, & Hyde - The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson

Alice - Go Ask Alice by Beatrice Sparks

The People In The Attic - The Diary Of A Young Girl by Anne Frank (this song features Spencer doing a very unconvincing German accent which, outside of the context of the song, is very funny)

Tess-Timony - Tess of the D’Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy

Hell In The Hallways - Carrie by Stephen King

The American Nightmare - A Nightmare On Elm Street

Thank God It’s Friday - Friday The 13th

Stabbing In The Dark - Halloween

SAVAGES - The Texas Chainsaw Massacre

The Jig Is Up - Saw

A Grave Mistake - The Crow

Rocking The Boat - Jaws (fun fact! This song features Jeremy Schwartz, the other founding member of the band and the lyrics contain the names of 5 of their 6 albums, excluding The Silver Scream)

Enjoy Your Slay - The Shining (another fun fact! In 2016 they put a vote to their fans to pick what piece of media the song they were working on would be based on, either The Shining or Psycho, I voted for Psycho because they already had a song based on a Stephen King story)

Freak Flag - The Devil’s Rejects

The World In My Hands - Edward Scissor-Hands

Merry Axe-Mas - Silent Night, Deadly Night

Love Bites - An American Werewolf In London

IT Is The End - It (including this one they have 3 songs based on Stephen King stories! His influence, ugh)

Your Number’s Up - Scream

More fun facts!

Aside from INK, Spencer also has a clothing company, Kleaver Klothing, which if they haven’t moved sites again, is at salem666.com

Last Year on their Summer tour they were supposed to play a show at a venue in Orlando, Florida that is on the grounds of Disney World. At the last minute Disney canceled their show because they’re performance was deemed “too violent” for a family park, despite the show already being 18+. In retaliation, the band released a series of limited edition merchandise featuring classic Disney characters as slasher villains, most notably Mickey Mouse as Freddy Kruger. They literally all sold out. I really should have got one when I had the chance

I own more pieces of Ice Nine Kills merch than literally any other piece of media I have ever consumed, including:

3 t shirts

2 tank tops

1 Letterman jacket

1 CD

2 vinyls

1 Kleaver t shirt (that I’m wearing right now)

1 poster

And a red balloon and paper boat from the IT Is The End music video promotion, (the boat is currently serving as a jewelry dish on my vanity)

I’ve seen them twice, Warped Tour 2016 and Warped Tour 2018, both times I met Spencer after the set and despite the whole scary act the band puts on during the shows, he’s very genuine and always really sweet to his fans. Enjoy these fetus pictures of me meeting him at 14 and 16 y/o

The lyric sheet for The Silver Scream is formatted like a spec script with action lines, scene headings, and inter-scene cuts, which screenwriting student me really, really enjoys

I got distracted while writing this because Patrick went live on Instagram, oops. He was setting up his new kit for the show tonight, it looks really cool, they’re painted to look like popcorn buckets

So that’s about it! Thank you for reading and enjoy the music!

[latin-dr-robotnik]

20 for the ask 👀

20.) Do you play any instruments? Which ones?

Oh! I have one Spanish guitar sitting in the corner of my bedroom! I’ve had it for the past 5 years and I play it very ocassionally. I tend to struggle with my short fingers when moving between chords, but it’s a fun little hobby I have. I’d love to add something more to my collection, like a proper acoustic guitar, a bass or something like that (my uncle had a bass, but that was like 20 years ago haha), but I’m not in a hurry right now.

I tend to play mostly basic stuff, some of my favorites being 80′s and 90′s songs, like Teléfonos/White Trash (that transition between the more soothing, melancholic Teléfonos and the more ska White Trash is my JAM), Sisters, Creep and the like, maybe something more recent like Una Triste Melodía (hold up, what do you mean it’s 14 years old now?)

fun fact: a couple of months ago I was kicking myself because I started playing Loco tu forma de ser and realized I became the thing I always hated - haven’t picked up the guitar since that jsjsjsjj

[randomvarious]

Perfect Thyroid - “Sanford and Son” Skandalous: I've Gotcha Covered 1996 Ska / Funk / Ska-Punk

Perfect Thyroid is a band that rarely performs anymore, but throughout much of the 90s and early 2000s, they were an absolute force. Hailing from New York’s Hudson Valley, this band, who tend to put both silliness and politics at a premium, were also effective pioneers of skunk music, that is, a fusion of ska, funk, and punk rock. Over their tenure, Perfect Thyroid have released a total of five albums and have toured relentlessly. Back home, they were known as the go-to band to open for just about any big act that came rolling through the region. As a result, because of both how good they are and how dynamic their overall sound is, they’ve shared stages with the likes of rock and roll royalty like Chuck Berry, Bruce Springsteen, and The B-52′s; big ska names like The Mighty Mighty Bosstones, Reel Big Fish, and Cherry Poppin’ Daddies; and a bunch of other popular bands and artists like Third Eye Blind, Goo Goo Dolls, Marcy Playground, Cake, The Roots, Youssou N’Dour, Fishbone, Toots and the Maytals, Judy Collins, Joan Osborne, King Sunny Adé, The Violent Femmes, and NRBQ.

Perfect Thyroid began in 1991 as a collection of friends who shared a likeminded love for similar music. After seeing one of their friend’s bands play, they then decided that they wanted to play, too. They recruited a couple of members from their friend’s band that they had just seen along with a handful of locals and then got to work. 

A bio on last.fm picks it up from there:

The band got together in a New Paltz [a town in the Hudson Valley] basement and the Hanson's [a pair of brothers in the band] garage and started churning out music. Driven by an intense desire to perform the music live, the group knew they needed enough material to play for 3 hours live (which is what most local bars were requiring at the time). In less than two months, they had written 14 original songs, and learned a slew of covers (including: Fishbone, The Specials, English Beat, James Brown, They Might Be Giants, Bad Manners, Joe Jackson, and the theme from Sanford & Son).

That cover of the theme from Sanford & Son never made it onto a Perfect Thyroid album, but after having performed it live a number of times, it did eventually get a studio treatment. In 1996, the cover exclusively appeared on a compilation of ska covers called Skandalous: I’ve Gotcha Covered, released by a label called Shanachie. The following year, Shanachie released Perfect Thyroid’s fourth album.

This cover of the Sanford & Son theme, which was originally composed by Quincy Jones and called “The Streetbeater,” is a wild fucking trip. After presenting a potent and lively mix of ska and funk, the band gradually allows bits of rock to seep in, eventually giving way to a high-speed, off-kilter, rambunctious brand of ska-punk. Separating this unexpected transition is some direct vocal referencing to Sanford and Son’s most famous catchphrase (”I’m comin’ to join ya, it’s the big one!”), which is then followed by an extended burst of energy which features a couple horn solos (one good, one purposely terrible), and even some organ at the end, too.

A really fun mix of ska, funk, and punk rock, courtesy of this band who are really good at fusing all of those sounds together.

[fuckyeahqueermusic]

FY!QM’s Favorite Albums of 2019 Part 2

Happy Super Bowl Sunday, here have a list of my favorite albums of 2019. You can click here to read part 1 if you missed it, but part 2 is all my absolute favorite releases from the year. Two of them aren’t even EPs, let alone full albums, but it is my list and I am the boss so I can do what I want!!

Obviously a ton of great music was released this year, but I think compared to 2018 it was a little lacking. Which is understandable, that was a bonkers killer year for new music, but I’m already psyched for all that’s coming out in 2020, and I have a feeling I am going to have a hard time doing a round up of everything I loved come next December (or January....or February, who’s to say!)

Anyways, onto my favs of 2019!

Carly Rae Jepsen — Dedicated Okay, so first off we have to talk about how one of the first working titles for this album was “Songs To Clean Your House To”, and how it is a CRIME we were deprived of that. Well, it will always be the real title in my heart.

So, Dedicated is not Emotion. It was never going to be Emotion, and that is okay. It is still an absolutely meticulously crafted, nearly perfect pop record. One that’s not only is full of great singles and individual certified bops (”Julien” anyone????), but actually works as a whole record, an increasing rarity in the mainstream pop landscape. But you can feel how much CRJ cares about what she puts out, and while some songs are weaker than others, there is no filler, and every track has something to enjoy on it. She is still the QUEEN of mid-tempo jams, with “No Drug Like Me,” “Too Much,” and “Automatically In Love” already up in the pantheon of all time mid-tempo jams. Some folks might have been disappointed we didn’t get Emotion 2.0, but I am thrilled CRJ wants to keep growing as an artist, and that she isn’t content to keep releasing the same thing over and over again, even though she very easily could.

Telethon — Hard Pop Telethon is hands down one of the best rock bands in the game right now, and I am thrilled they finally seem to be gaining a bit of traction outside the extremely cult following they’ve been building over the past five years. They have hooks for days, their music a master class in power pop song writing, combined with some of the densest lyric writing I have ever seen. Lead singer and lyricist Kevin Tully crafts each song like a short story about millennial mundanity and quarter life crises: using the exhaustion of finding a new apartment to examine long simmering anxiety, or trying to figure out if contentment is settling, and being too tired to know if you can tell the difference, while getting asked if you have weed at a terrible house party. It’s an album that feels like your late 20’s and early 30’s, with just enough optimism from a synth line to let you know that maybe everything will be okay in the end, maybe not, but it’s not stupid to hope.

Also they are not afraid of a ska influenced breakdown, and for that I must salute them.

Great Grandpa — Four of Arrows This is far and away my most listened to album of the year, and it only came out in October. Every song is masterfully crafted to stick in your head, and whenever I put on “Bloom,” “Rosalie,” or “Treat Jar,” I HAVE to listen to it at least three times in a row. The songwriting on this album is just fucking astonishing, and it completely runs the gamut from acoustic driven indie to 80’s big power chord pop rock, without feeling incongruent at all. It is incredible that this is the same band that made Plastic Cough only two years ago. Not that their debut was bad, but this album is just such a massive leap in skill and sound that it is truly amazing. Just a completely beautiful record from front to back, and I am so excited to see where this band goes next.

that dog — Old LP For the last 3 years that dog’s one semi-hit from 1997, “Never Say Never,” has been in my top 5 played songs of the year on Spotify (it currently has 186,000 plays. I would wager about 100,000 of those are me). I would argue it is the catchiest song ever written. It was on an album, Retreat From The Sun, that is back to back to back catchy jams. that dog should’ve been one of the most famous bands in the world, and I have been lamenting hard for some time that we never got more music from them. They broke up in 1997, scattering to the winds to be involved in making some of your favorite music (Josie and the Pussycats soundtrack anyone???)

Until last year. Anna Waronker got the band back together and that dog released their first album in 22 years, Old LP. And it’s like barely any time has passed. Old LP is practically perfect 90’s pop-rock, insanely catchy with enough of an edge and interesting flourishes (they credit basically a whole orchestra in the liner notes) to make you want to put the whole thing on repeat for a few hours. Or maybe that’s just me. Either way, I am so happy that dog is back in some capacity, and here’s hoping this is not the last we hear of them. 

(Also I picked this live performance of “Bird On A Wire” cause Allison Crutchfield from Swearin’ is there???)

Fireworks — Demitasse single This is not an album, or even an EP, but this is my list and I can do what I want and that includes fawning over a single from what is sure to be one of my top albums of 2020. Fireworks’ reunion was my biggest surprise of the year. They are a band that defined the last decade for me, their lifespan cut too short due to a crowded market and evolving too fast for their audience (they should be The Wonder Years level of famous and beloved, as they were, no offense to Soupy and the boys, the superior band). But after four years away they returned with a 6 minute slow burn of a song, solemn and sparse, until the full band crashes in more than ¾ of the way through. The first time I got to 5:08 in the song, the mix of pure catharsis and active anger that they disbanded in 2015 and we were denied new material from them until now I felt guaranteed Higher Lonely Power will almost certainly be THE album of 2020.

Team Dresch — Your Hands My Pocket “7 Perhaps even more important than Fireworks comeback, the biggest music news of 2019 for me was Team Dresch’s reunion. They are a band that I trace pretty much all my modern musical tastes to, and they are hugely influential to me and so many others in what they proved was possible for queer music to be. When that reunion ALSO came with new music, I about lost my mind. “Your Hands My Pocket” sounds like no time has passed since Captain My Captain came out: perfect hooks, heartfelt earnest lyrics, the vocal trade off between Jody Bleyle and Kaia Wilson, and all the queer pop-punk jubilation I want. The b-side “Baskets,” is classic Team Dresch emo (and yes I will argue to the ends of the earth that Team Dresch is one of the best emo bands of the 90s), with big volume shifts and longing vocals (and that bridge!). The only bad thing about this release is that there’s not more! Maybe if we all beg hard enough, they’ll make one more album.

[notesonnotes]

Notes on Hyperview

Hey music fam! Today we’re taking a look at a band called Hyperview!  Hyperview is a 5 member pop/punk/emo/hardcore band from Buffalo, NY. Each member took a little time to answer some questions for us to get to know them and the band a little more. Take a few and see what they had to say!

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NON: How did you all meet? What drew you to start a band?

AJ: I’m AJ and I do a lot of yelling. I was trying to get a band together in Los Angeles and then again in Sacramento. Nothing really stuck so I figured I’d move back to the east coast and landed in Buffalo. I met Courtney and Matt online. They were looking for a guitarist for a new project since their last pop/punk band had some sort of falling out. Couple of changes to the lineup and now I’m on vocals with the additions of Steve and Chuck for guitars. I’ve always wanted to play music since middle school, but I didn’t start teaching myself guitar and singing until about high school.

Courtney: I'm Courtney,  I play the drums. I've played music the majority of my life. I was involved in small projects in high school, and took classes in college that was playing as a band. Then after I graduated I wanted to do it all for real.

Steve: Hey I’m Steve and I play bass. I've been friends with Matt for years and he invited me to play in the band. He's been doing projects for a while and I wanted to be a part of this one.

Chuck:  The band was already established for about a year or so before I joined. Actually, I met the singer through a craigslist ad, and spoke to him on Instagram, and I guess we had common ground of what we wanted musically.

Matt: I’m Matt and I do guitar/backups. We all met through a various series of online forum postings.  Whether they were from other bands or pieces of older bands we all used to be in.  The exception is Steve which I met through high school friends, whom I eventually became roommates with.  We all started bands for different reasons for different times in our lives.  I started a band when I was younger to have a place I could go, express myself, and probably fit in.  It was a long time ago and I don’t really remember exactly why, but I’m sure it had something to do with thinking I was an outcast when I probably wasn’t. 

NON: What drew you to this style of music?

AJ: I went to middle school in Coral Springs, FL and there was this upcoming pop/punk band building a sweet culture around town. It was New Found Glory. Meanwhile, my older sister was showing me bands like Senses Fail, Hawthorne Heights, and Panic! at the Disco.

Courtney: I grew up listening to this style of music my entire life and have always had it ingrained into me.

Steve: I was a big ska and punk kid growing up. As those scenes faded away pop punk started to pick up so that was the natural progression musically. I guess my sharp edges got rounded off over the years and I became more attuned to the melodic side of things.

Chuck:   I’ve been into pop-punk stuff since I was a kid. The first CD I ever bought was New Found Glory’s “sticks and stones” from media play.

Matt: Pop punk was the first style of music I actually connected to.  I mean I had a stack of my old man’s records, a Coolio CD, some Weird Al, and a bunch of mail order albums you’d grab out of your neighbors mailbox. Though none of it hit quite like Blink 182 and NFG in the summer.

NON: What's the story behind the band name?

AJ: I really loved Title Fights album Hyperview and thought it would be a cool name for the band.

Steve: Needed a name, AJ gets name credit

Chuck: I’m assuming it’s derived from a super tight album, that everyone should listen to.

Matt: The band name came from giving up on finding a name that we came up with because every band name was taken already, so we just used an album name one person in the band had listened to.  It was most likely better off we went with a name that isn’t so genre conforming, so you have to listen to the music before you hate it and not just going off the name. NON: What has been your favorite venue to play so far?

AJ: I think my favorite show was at BJs in Fredonia. It was only like our second show and the placed was PACKED out. Those college kids didn’t come for us but they still jumped around with us and sang the words to our cover songs. ‘Twas sick!

Courtney: So far my favorite place we play at is Mr. Goodbar, the turn out is always amazing and we always have such a good time.

Steve: Favorite venue is rec room

Chuck: My personal favorite was Rec Room, here in Buffalo. We’ve had good times at Goodbar and Mohawk place as well.

Matt: Being a small local band, all venues are pretty much the same and rating them of ‘best’ is going to be biased by how good the crowd was.  If we had 12 people going hard in a dumpster canister off Bailey then that would be the best venue we played.  That being said, I loved BJ’s in Fredonia, I only wished we had this incantation of the band coupled with the live experience we’ve gained since. NON: What is your dream venue?

AJ: Don’t really got one, honestly. I think venues are second to the people. I’d rather have twenty raging kids in a basement than five head bobbing peeps at a larger venue.

Courtney: The dream for right now would be to play Town Ballroom, and then it just goes up from there.

Steve: Dream venue is an aircraft carrier. We play while mortal Kombat happens in front of us

Chuck: Honestly, probably the Town Ballroom or Riverworks. It’s always been a dream of mine to play on a big stage right at home.

Matt: Dream actual venue is either Red Rocks or the O2.  I don’t really think about venues like that because when you are facing the reality of music, it’s the moon away.  I just want to be in people’s lives to a point I could have a career in the industry. NON: Who are some of your inspirations?

AJ: The bands I listed earlier are definitely inspirations. It’s hard to narrow down but a handful of my favorites would include: Silverstein, The Story So Far, Balance and Composure, mewithoutYou, letlive. and A Day To Remember

Courtney: As far as playing music and drums, the artists that inspire me most would have to be Dani Abasi, Cyrus Bolooki, and Jake Massucco.

Steve: Less than Jake, Rancid, Blink, Story so far, Four year strong

Chuck: I’m a complete sucker for the 90’s and 2000’s pop-punk and emo bands. New Found Glory, Bayside, Sum 41, Taking Back Sunday etc.

Matt: Inspirations, well there are a lot of people I think are great artists.  Without sounding like I bottle my own farts and age them like a fine wine; I (at this age) am more inspired by the general culture of art in any medium.  Anything that you can feel the creative effort in, even if you don’t understand it or even do it.  I watched this guy rehab old paintings.  That inspired me. I didn’t want to clean an early 20th century fruit study, but you know what I mean. NON: Where do you see yourself/selves in 5 years?

AJ: Hopefully in a city near you touring our butts off!

Courtney: In five years, I would like to have toured and to continue doing tours across the states or if we get lucky in another country.

Steve: On that aircraft carrier baby

Chuck: Hopefully on the road with some super rad bands, playing in really cool venues, for really awesome people.

Matt: 5 to7? Probably washed up as fuck somewhere, but I tried

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[dherzogblog]

songs/19

“I listen so you don't have to”

Hey everyone, we’re back! enjoy some music and musings from the last year

Make sure to click on there bold type for music links and extras!

Lizzo- Juice Lizzo burst into 2019 with a hit song, huge album and wildly successful tour. The “pudding in the proof “. Easily the catchiest tune of the year with an irresistible Bruno Mars 80′s funk vibe, She has the kind of star power and charisma that makes her appealing to just about everyone, including your aunt, who no doubt will be grooving to this on bar mitzvah dance floors for years to come. Blame it on her juice.

Jen Awad- Hungover

Big voiced, post Amy Winehouse soul singer blames it on the juice too. Maybe she was with Lizzo the night before?

Charley Crockett- How Low Can You Go?

Multi ethnic Americana singer/songwriter delivers one of my favorite albums of the year where he effortlessly moves from country to blues to soul. He also recorded one of my favorite country covers of the year (see bottom of this blog for more info on that). His girl is breaking his heart (blame it on the juice again?) on this R&B styled song from a non album single.

Durand Jones and The Indications-  Circles

More sweet 70′s soul, quiet storm style. The swirling strings and Delfonics harmonies would sound perfect coming out of the 8 Track player in your Pinto.

Dr.John- Such A Night (1941-2019)

A true music renaissance man. Starting as a teen in the studios of New Orleans, he learned his trade at the feet of the masters, playing R&B, jazz, and blues with equal skill and feel. The good doctor, (AKA Mac Rebbenack) went on to become an unlikely rock star in the early 70′s with his psychedelic and voodoo inspired Night Tripper alter ego. His long career found him playing several roles along the way, session man, producer, and The Big Easy’s unofficial funk ambassador. I picked this live version of the song because: A. He’s backed beautifully by The Band, B. It’s one of my favorite performances from The Last Waltz, and C. The live setting let’s you hear him stretch out a bit on the keyboards. I watched him perform many times, headlining or sitting in with others at Jazz Fest. No matter what the setting, he always fit right in and found the groove. Piano man, sideman, shaman, there was only one Dr.John.

Van Morrison - Early Days

Like Dr. John, Van’s been around long enough to recall the birth of rock and roll. Throughout his career he never stopped paying tribute to his roots and those who inspired him. You can hear it in his musical references, cover tunes and name checks. At The Hollywood Bowl in October I got to see an unusually joyous performance as he wistfully traced a lifetime of musical influences across R&B, jazz and blues. His latest release is an unabashed love letter to those good old days, three chords and the truth.

Spiral Stairs- Fingerprintz

Scott Kannberg is one of the co-founders of Indie rock legends Pavement. But truth is I never took much of an interest in them. I happened to read about his solo project where he mentioned listening to a lot of  Van Morrison and Nick Lowe while recording. That seemed like a  good enough reason for me to check it out. There are familiar ‘fingerprints” on this one, as you can definitely hear him channeling Van.

Vampire Weekend- This Life

Hardly anyone is ambivalent about Vampire Weekend. Their preppy east coast look, and sleeve wearing, dad rock influences make them polarizing at best. Doesn’t matter to me, I like their catchy hooks, bone dry lyrics, caribbean rhythms, and ringing guitars.This is easily the sunniest song about cheating I ever heard.

The English Beat- Whine and Grind/Stand Down Margaret Ranking Roger (1953-2019)

in January of 1980 England was in the grips of 2 Tone mania, the pop music movement that came dancehall crashing out of the UK Midlands, and for a brief black and white checkered moment, dominated the British charts. At the center of the scene were The Specials whose founder Jerry Dammers launched the 2 Tone label and created the blueprint for it’s sound, inspired by the Jamaican music he heard as a kid. These bands (including The Selecter and Madness), combined ska, reggae and punk that launched a brief music and fashion movement. They dressed in a mod black and white style making the look nearly as important as their sound. For most of these bi-racial bands, the goal was to make you dance AND think, with lyrics focusing on social and political issues affecting young people in Thatcher’s Britain. The track here is a good example of that.

I arrived in London on a traveling seminar ready to check it all out, as a college radio DJ I was already a fan of The Clash’s punky reggae. and I had read several dispatches from the British music tabloids like NME and Melody Maker. First chance I got, I was off to a record store where I stood at a listening station to hear The Special’s debut LP.  I was instantly transformed into a card carrying 2 Tone fan boy. As a student, without much money with a long trip ahead, I couldn't afford The Specials album, but I did buy a 45 by the label’s latest signing, The Beat.

The A side was a cover of Smokey Robinson & The Miracle’s “Tears Of A Clown”. It took a minute to get used to hearing the Motown classic played in their energetic ska sound. The tune ends with Ranking Roger “toasting” over the track reggae DJ style, not something heard much outside of Jamaica back then. Side B featured Roger taking lead and riding over a bouncy stop and start rhythm titled “Ranking Full Stop”. It was an instant 2 Tone classic, and I now had a new favorite band.

The Beat (AKA The English Beat) after just one 2 Tone single, were given their own Go-Feet label and releasing a full length album later that year. Their songs seemed to have a slightly more authentic Jamaican sound than the others, dubbier, upbeat and fun. In addition they dabbled in world music and afropop long before it became chic. I saw them perform on their first US tour in Boston later that year.

As the 2 Tone moment waned back home, the group quickly focused on the American audience, touring constantly in the process. The Beat were definitely the band most committed to breaking in the states and nearly did. By the third album, they gained some traction at US radio (particularly here in LA at KROQ) and played the US Festival, but it was too late. The band was already fracturing. Lead singer Dave Wakeling and Roger left unceremoniously in 1983 to form the short lived and mildly successful General Public, while bandmates Andy Cox and David Steele formed the much more successful Fine Young Cannibals. despite some huge hits, they too were short lived.

The original band never reunited. Roger and Wakeling performed together as The Beat for awhile, later each forming his own version. Roger in the UK and Dave in the US. Dave’s version tours constantly to this day. The 2 Tone label didn't last long and the music never truly caught on here. Ultimately suffering the same fate as other short lived UK music fads like Glam Rock or The New Romatics. Their impact was strong enough though to fuel the much maligned ska third wave of the 90′s, and bring Jamaican music a bit farther into the mainstream. All that really remains are the three great studio albums and the memory of their exciting live shows.

I booked the band on a CNN talk show in 1982. I remember they seemed frustrated and were already hinting at a challenged future for the group. Less than a year later they were done for good. I recall desperately wanting them to succeed, bringing my favorite band and the 2 Tone music to the masses. It’s hard to imagine there was a ever a time in your life when a pop group could break your heart like that. 

Foe me and other recovering rude boys/rude girls, the music endures, as does the message.  And today when I hear them streaming into my ear buds, I still want to “move my likkle feet and dance to the beat”, which for the dearly departed Roger I have to think, was always the point.  #loveandunity

The Special- Vote For Me

Politics and social issues remain front and center as the 2 Tone founders return with their first album since the 80′s. Reunited for many years now, this current version of the band boasts more original members of The Fun Boy Three than the original The Specials. That did not stop them from delivering a totally respectable and relevant effort. You can hear dark echos of their classic "Ghost Town” on this dubby tune no doubt inspired by Brexit.

Eddie And The Hot Rods- Do Anything You Wanna Do Barrie Masters (1956-2019)

in 1976/77 Eddie and the Hot Rods stood at the intersection of pub rock and punk as one scene fizzled, and the other burned down everything in its path. The Hot Rods had the classic straight ahead sound of the pub bands plus an attitude that leaned forward into the energy punk would embrace. They enjoyed a brief moment of UK chart success before literally falling into the cracks of the pop music scene. This song, one of my all time favorite singles, sum them up perfectly. Drawing a straight line from Graham Parker to The Clash with a touch of a classic Springsteen working class anthem. In other words....perfect.

Beach Slang- Tommy In The 80′s

When I first saw the title of this song immediately assumed it was a Beach Slang’s tribute to The  Replacements guitarist Tommy Stinson . And even though Tommy himself plays on the track, it is not about him! In fact, it’s actually a tribute to obscure 80′s power popper Tommy Keene. I remembered the name from my MTV days, but honestly had to wiki him for clarification. Despite all these references, the whole thing sounds more inspired by “Jessie’s Girl” than either Tommy. 

The Cars- My Best Friends Girl Ric Ocasek (1941-2019)

Truthfully. I was never a big Cars fan. But in my college days before digital music, you listened to whatever the radio played. And in Boston, they played The Cars a lot. It wasn’t long before they rose from local heroes to national charts toppers. They didn't have the bluesy street cred or swagger of hometown legends Aerosmith or The J Geils Band, but they were our very own neighborhood rock stars. Drummer David Robinson lived in the building next door to Noreen on Comm Ave, and it was always kinda cool to see them strolling around Back Bay or hanging out at a club. Their sound was little cold and metallic for me, but you couldn't deny they crafted pretty great pop and new wave singles. They were omnipresent sound of my college days. The hits literally followed me to MTV and NYC in the 80′s where I often spotted Ric and Paulina strolling hand in hand in Chelsea. This classic love triangle was always my favorite with it’s Tommy James like guitar at the top, handclaps, and unforgettable hook. The band disbanded long ago, but like the classic American automobiles, these songs were built to last.

The Neighborhoods- Don’t Look Down

The Cars were the only Boston group of the era to truly make it big, but that late 70′s scene boasted several other talented bands who scored label deals including: The Nervous Eaters, The Rings, The Paley Brothers, Robin Lane and the Chartbusters, The Fools, The Real Kids, The Stompers, and Mission Of Burma. Later on, The Lyres, The Neats The Del Fuegos, The Mighty Mighty Bosstones, and Murphy’s Law  all managed to find the big time. It was a great time for local music back then. A city filled with students, plenty of clubs to pack on weekends, and college and commercial radio stations willing to play local bands. There were many good acts around town then, and my favorite, without a doubt, were The Neighborhoods. A young, brash power trio led by charismatic lead singer David Minehan. They played a ferocious brand of power pop/punk that would leave their audience breathless. I was certain they were destined for stardom. In the spring of 1979 they released their debut single “Prettiest Girl” on a local label and massive airplay on both college and commercial radio followed. They instantly became the hottest band in town, poised to become the next band from Boston to make it big. But it never happened. Bad luck, poor management and infighting derailed all the momentum. Before you knew it, the gritty street quality that was The ‘Hoods trademark was pushed aside by the synthesized sound of MTV. Over the course of the 80′s and into the 90′s they managed to release some pretty good albums on a variety of indie labels, but it never came together for them. The band reunited and gigs occasionally but hadn’t recorded for many years until right now. Forty years later, the neighborhood may not look the same, but their sound and spirit somehow survive. I suppose there’s something tragic and romantic about a great band lost to time, remembered only by the few who saw them way back when. They really were great, but I guess you had to be there.

Jesse Mailn - Meet Me At The End Of The World Again

New York’s favorite son, soul survivor, and street poet Jesse Malin is back. He’s been around long enough to understand that “When it all blows up, when it all goes down, when it makes you sick, but you’re still around” is victory in itself.  It’s the only life he knows, so what can a poor boy do? 

Brittany Howard- Stay High

This is from Alabama Shakes lead singer's excellent solo debut, unselfconsciously celebrating private moments spent with a lover on this  rootsy and gentle ballad. Her soulful falsetto conveys the kind of lustful bliss you might expect from Al Green or Prince. 

Mississippi All Stars- Mean Old World

Bear with me. This one is tangled up in the roots of several southern rock legacies and is going to take a minute to unpack. The All Stars are led by Luther and Cody Dickinson, sons of legendary Memphis musician and wild man Jim Dickinson. They decided to cover T Bone Walker’s Mean Old World,  a blues number once recorded by Eric Clapton and Duane Allman as part of the historic Derek And The Dominos sessions. The track, featuring their dad Jim, did not make the original release but was later unearthed on an expanded reissue. Still with me?  So, as a bit of a tribute, the guys recorded their own version of the tune and invited Duane Betts, son of Allman Brothers guitarist Dickey Betts to record an Eat a Peach inspired guitar run at the end.

And oh yeah, Jason Isbell is on it as well.

Got all that? 

Samantha Fish- Kill Or Be Kind

Have seen Samantha live several times over the past few years. She’s a very good blues/rock guitarist, vocalist and an exciting live performer. On the sultry “Kill or be Kind” she gives her lover an ultimatum. Fun fact: One of my son’s best friends from high school (Kate Pearlman) wrote two tracks on the album!

Jade Jackson- Bottle It Up

Second album from this promising up and coming alt country artist. She’s on the super cool Anti label which providing immediate credibility and her albums are produced by Social D frontman Mike Ness. And when she’s not on the road she waitress’s at her parent’s restaurant in central California. I’m not sure you can get any more country than that.

The Highwomen- Redesigninig Women

Inspired by The Highwaymen of Willie, Waylon, Johnny and Kris, this all female country “supergroup” quartet is out to break the stereotypes in country music with some really fine songs. While the male Highwaymen banded together to rescue careers in decline, these women (Brandi Carlisle, Amanda Shires, Marren Morris, and Natalie Hemby), are all on the rise. This song is lot of fun.

John Prine- Unwed Fathers

John Prine is back with a remake of his heartbreaking tale of teenage pregnancy. He’s joined this time Margo Price. I got to see Prine live this fall at the beautiful Anson Ford Amphitheater here in LA. His simple, plain spoken lyrics and songs are timeless. I attended the show with my pal David Kissinger who observed that despite health issues, “Prine remains an national songwriting treasure and his performance was as life affirming as you’ll ever see.” Can’t say it any better than that.

Shovels And Rope- Mississippi “Nuthin

Ever wonder whatever happened to that perfect couple from high school? You know, the high school quarterback and the prom queen? This one ain’t “Glory Days”. Our QB peaked in high school and never makes it back to the end zone again, plus he's tortured by the success his old flame enjoys. His anguish and desperation are palpable in this barn burner of a song whose vocals draw inspiration from June & Johnny and John & Exene.

The Delines- Eddie and Polly

Eddie and Polly are young and in love, and doomed. Vocalist Amy Boone’s world weary vocals always sound like it’s 3AM. This one won’t do much for your holiday spirit, but it’s haunting melody might stay with you throughout it.

Yola - Love all Night (Work All Day)

Love the one your with is (at least after work) is the basic idea on this track from this UK performer’s debut long player. Produced by Dan Auerbach of The Black Keys, the collection is full of excellent retro soul-folk. There was a fair amount of buzz in front of the release and she more than lives up to it including a nomination for a Best New Artist Grammy. 

Mavis Staples + Norah Jones- I’ll Be Gone

First recorded effort form this duo. A bittersweet ballad that softly and soulfully looks ahead to a final salvation. But Mavis ain’t done yet. She’s still going strong, recording and touring constantly. She knows she may be running out of time, but there’s still work to do. And whenever she’s finally ready, you can be sure she’ll take us there.

Hope you and yours are well.  The Herzog’s wish you the best and look forward to seeing you in the new year.  For those of you who made it this far, thank you. I’ve got a bonus playlist for you. Artists you like playing songs you love:  covers/19 Enjoy.

peace,

Doug

Los Angeles, December 2019 

[purplefrayedisaster]

Task 002

01. what’s your name/alias you go by ?? Michelle, Mich or Problem Child. Just ask Steph about that. 

02. what’s your age ?? 33... I’m an old lady. -waves cane around-

03. what’s your zodiac sign  ?? The BEST sign there is... Libra

04. what’s your ethnicity ?? Swedish, Norwegian, Polish, Italian, Scottish, and Irish   

05. what’s your nationality ?? American

06. what’s your favorite band and/or musical artist  ?? I have too many faves dude... but I’ll say atm, it’s Less Than Jake. I love all types of music as long as the lyrics make sense.  I’m the type of person that can go from listening to classic rock to opera to ska to reggae to a musical.     

07. what’s your dream job ??  A Marine-biologist, Zoologist, Paleontologist, Archeologist, Veterinarian, Equestrian... look,I had a lot of dream jobs when I was a child.  

08. what’s one place you would love to visit ?? Japan or Swedeen 

09. what’s your favorite tv show ?? Buffy the vampire slayer, Xena: warrior princess, Charmed (90′s), Are you Afraid of the Dark

10. what’s your favorite movie ?? STICK IT, The Mighty Ducks, Lord of the Rings, The Never Ending Story.

11. what’s your favorite song ?? ATM, it’s When The Story Ends

12. what’s your favorite sport ?? Ice Dancing

13. what’s your favorite food ?? ALL THE FOOD!! but if I have to pick one... sushi

14. what’s your favorite face claim to use ?? Troian, she is just so freak beautiful. AND distracting whenever I have to pick a gif. 

15. what’s your least favorite face claim: ?? Keegan Allen, honestly his face reminds me this guy I worked with that was an ass. Sorry Keegan.

16. what’s your favorite character of yours to play ?? Syria, she is my first muse.  <3     which do you think you’re most like      Going to have to say I’m a mix of all of them. but mostly Elenwe and you’ll see why.  -evil laughter-

17. what’s your sexuality ??  I be a Lesbain

18. what’s the last movie you saw in a cinema/theater ?? Bohemian Rhapsody with my dad.

19. what’s the worst injury you’ve ever had ?? Nothing... thank the powers that be. 

20. what’s a random or interesting fact about you ?? I have a slight learning disability... -shrugs-

21. do you listen to music while you write ?? depends on my mood or if I’m trying to get into the zone. or make others cry.

22. are you a morning, day, evening, or night writer ?? I'm good with all of them, but I do like night more. only because no one can bug me. 

23. have you ever roleplayed intoxicated ?? Nope, I’m a stick in the mud. 

24. what language or languages do you speak ?? Just English... horribly I might add.  

25. how long have you roleplayed ??   Um.. when was Glee-Fusion a thing? Cause I blame EVERYONE involved in that RP. They really dragged me into it. 

26. favorite roleplay genre ?? I love Scifi, fantasy, supernatural and future 

27. one sound you hate & one you love ??  Hate: an animal in pain. Love: A music box... and opera

28. do you believe in ghosts ?? Yes... I do. 

29. do you believe in aliens ??     Yup, we are one big SIMS game to them. 

30. do you believe in true love ?? Eh... yeah, I am a hopeless romantic 

31. do you hold grudges ?? I try not to anymore. but customers SUCK!!! so no, no grudges here.

32. do you have any obsessions right now ?? Umm.. beside Tomb Raider and Assassins Creed and rewatching Avatar the Last Airbender. cause Azula is awesome.... nope. 

33. do you drive & if so, have you ever been in a crash ?? Yes and yes.

34. do you like the smell of gasoline ?? It’s not the worst smell

35. do you prefer writing fluff, angst, or smut ?? Fluff and A LOT of angst. Smut not so much.

36. are you in a relationship ?? Single and pretty happy.  

37. grab the nearest book to you and turn to page 23, what is the 17the line informative, I asked, “have you seen someone that looks like a princess?” -Breaking Legacies (read it... it’s pretty good)

38. put your playlist on shuffle and list the first four songs that pop up:

Wait which playlist... I have many to help RP. I know what one to pick my Syrpen list XD

Head over feet - Alanis Morissette (acoustic version)

Castle on the Hill - Ed Sheeran

Perfect - Boyce Avenue

Song Bird - Glee version 

[notyourmothersplaylist]

England’s Forgotten Club Kids: The Rum Runner

There’s a lot to be said about the Club Kids of the 1980/1990s. Too much for films, documentaries, books, and certainly too much for a short blog post that’ll certainly be more photos than words. Simply put, the true ‘Club Kids’ were a group of misfits in the late 80s/90s who f*cked up New York City. There were so many I can’t name them, and they liked drugs, electronic music, and the scene culminated in a grisly murder of one of their own, by one of their own.

Before them, however, there were the Blitz Kids in London—named for the Blitz Club, where Boy George was a cloak attendant and Spandau Ballet was the house band—and the new-romantics who frequented the Rum Runner just short 2-hour train north in Birmingham, where the boys of Duran Duran were bussing tables at 8 and took the stage by 10. There’s quite an amount of literature on the Blitz Club, but not as much on the Rum Runner; so for the first post in a vintage club series I may never finish, let’s take a look at the history of Birmingham’s Rum Runner and some of its most exciting patrons.

The Rum Runner was a casino before Paul and Michael Berrow, the two sons of the club’s original founder, renovated the place after a particularly exciting trip to New York City wherein they visited Studio 54 (Brits may not admit it all that often, but they’re kinda obsessed with America, in the same way Americans are obsessed with Brits). The Berrows wallpapered the place with mirrored glass resembling of what it might look like to step inside a disco ball, painted any other visible walls black, and opened the doors with visions of David Bowie dancing in their heads (they hosted club nights spotlighting tunes from Roxy Music, Chic, Bowie, and many other glam rock giants, which attracted all the coolest kids in Birmingham, naturally). In 1978, cool kids Nicholas Bates and Nigel Taylor (who would then become Nick Rhodes and John Taylor) handed the Berrows a demo tape for their fledgling band Duran Duran and the rest is history; they held auditions until D-Squared became a full-fledged band with a guitarist and everything, and the Berrows became their managers.

Guitarist Andy Taylor recounts many interesting things in his book “Wild Boy” (a fantastic read) about the Rum Runner. He writes about working with the Berrows, helping maintain the interior of the club by polishing the mirrors, touching up paint, and whipping up burgers in the kitchen in exchange for free rehearsal space. He talks about the wild behavior of the club-goers—how flamboyantly they dressed, how they acted like rules and behavior norms didn’t apply, and how sex, drugs, and glam rock were paramount. He also talks about the aptly named ‘Sex Offender’s Room’ (“People weren’t politically correct, then”, he writes), where the Durans and the Berrows dragged in a nice fluffy bed in a vacant corner…and then would purposefully walk in on one another when they were enjoying the, uh, intimate company of their guests.

Yeah, they truly did that.

(All-around handyman Andy Taylor, busboy Roger Taylor, and deejay Nick Rhodes, from the Rum Runner Facebook page)

Another thing they did is run their official Fan Club upstairs from the f*ck room in the club they also worked at. I can confirm this because I have the card to prove it:

(Yes, this is a hand-me-down from my Duranie Aunt, and now something that is in my possession and that I cherish dearly).

Through the years, Dexy’s Midnight Runners, Ub40 and the English Beat would also become regulars there, amongst others, and the English Beat would go on to film their video for “Mirror in the Bathroom” with the Rum Runner as the setting, aptly named for the mirrors that swallowed the entire club (these are some of the best interior shots of the club I’ve seen, and the song is a killer ska jam!). The Berrows would go on to manage Duran Duran until the mid ‘80s, just before the release of 1986’s Notorious. The Rum Runner would also face its final curtain in 1986, where they hosted a ‘Demolition Party’ before the club closed for good, and now a Hyatt hotel stands on its former grounds on Broad St (so don’t go looking for it).

The Rum Runner held happy memories for many. Jeremy Green writes on an old Duran video showcasing clips from the club about one of his contemporaries, Gay John (who was a prolific member of the new romantic scene/gay community in Birmingham, more on him later): “I remember one night Gay John went around The Rum Runner Club sticking his vibrator in people's drinks.. Fun times. :p :p :P” (Gay John sounds like fun. Where is Gay John now?). Keith Hill, probably also a dude from Birmingham, writes “Had my 21st Birthday party here...how cool is that?...I believe John Taylor was seen there, love to say I invited him, but maybe cooler to say…he crashed my party! Hiding in barrels, dodgy goings on in barrels…& the toilets of course, the multi sexual toilets.”

What he might have meant was, there was a unisex area where men and women could apply makeup at the club, but he also...could have meant other things.

In fact, he most certainly also meant other things, if Andy’s accounts of the club’s wild party-goers are to be trusted. Also, there were barrels. Was this place even real?

A patron named Rob goes on to write he met his wife at the Rum Runner, and now they’ve got grown children, which is a fun and unnecessary fact to share, I suppose, but the internet is full of that; Andy Taylor also claims to have spent much time with his then-girlfriend-current-wife Tracey there, as well (seriously, they’ve been married for ages, which is incredibly sweet), even asking her to be his wife after throwing back one too many drinks within the mirrored walls. For a joint with a f*ck room, the place seems pretty damn wholesome.

(He also did cocaine there on Christmas Eve, though, so let’s not get ahead of ourselves.)

Going back to Gay John, though-- I’ve grown incredibly obsessed with him in the short time I’ve been researching the Rum Runner and I’d love to find more information on him. Gay John is almost always mentioned in reminiscent comments by the old Rum Runner club-goers on chat boards/comment spaces, although only by means of a sentence or passing mention; that being said, video footage of Gay John does exist, as he’s featured in Duran Duran’s Planet Earth video doing the ‘New Romantic Shuffle’ with fellow Brummie clubgoer who went by the name ‘Lavinya’. 

(Who’s who? I can’t even say.)

Gay John was, as you might guess, a member of the gay community in Birmingham who worked with many drag artists and was also apparently involved in the Rocky Horror community; he also owned a strip-club called the Tin Can in Birmingham’s Digbeth area, where glam/goth tyrants like Sisters of Mercy, the Jesus and Mary Chain and Flesh for Lulu would go on to play. Apparently someone died there during a show, though, so who’s to say what really happened there or when it closed (nobody’s said anything otherwise, so I’m guessing it’s closed). If anyone has information on the Tin Can Club or Gay John, please let me know!

I’ve not got much else to say other than the internet was kind to me when I started searching for Rum Runner lore, and it sounds like a fantastic place to have frequented in its day. It might not be the Limelight or the Blitz, but for a bunch of working-class kids, it was a place of decadence and self-indulgence. Because we can’t see it for ourselves, I’ll try to paint a picture as best I can for you to the tune of the Rum Runner Playlist, with songs hand-picked by resident DJ Nick Rhodes to evoke memories of when he was still pressed for cash and most likely dying his own hair.

   All photos below will be credited to their owners as best I can. Enjoy!

Sources: The Guardian, Carpenter & Joiner, Birmingham_81 on Twitter, BirminghamLive / a second article from BirminghamLive, Duran Duran Wiki, Shapers of the 80′s, Gay Birmingham Remembered, Birmingham Music Archive, John Taylor’s and Andy Taylor’s books, and last but certainly not least, the community-run Facebook page for the Rum Runner

[marcoshassanlevy]

Marcos Hassan

| 7 months ago

José-Manuel Thomas Arthur Chao Ortega is perhaps France’s most successful rock musician of all time, not to mention an inimitable icon of rock en español. Yet he probably feels more comfortable being labeled a busker: a musician in the street playing his heart out, observing his surroundings, and making songs about it. He’s known to pop up on the sidewalk next to any given bar of any given city he happens to be in at the moment and start playing. Busking is what taught Manu Chao about the universality of music, and it informs Clandestino, his debut solo album. The project turns 20 this year, and remains perhaps his boldest statement yet.

There’s nothing conventional about Clandestino, yet its radicalism relies on humanist values. Although his former band Mano Negra was at one point one of the most popular musical groups in France, Manu renounced the country as his own, disappearing on the road and appearing throughout Mexico, South America, Europe or Africa, something that allowed him to reach audiences beyond traditional borders. The label “world music” – a genre coined by Western record companies as an umbrella term to market folkloric and popular music from across the globe, lumping them together without much context – became widely used around that time, but few artists embodied that kind of post-globalist utopia. Clandestino also rekindled “protest pop” in a way seldom heard before, contributing to a discourse of sociopolitical unrest and selling more than 5 million copies along the way without a supporting tour or official singles released to radio.

In many ways, Clandestino is the album Manu Chao was born to make. Chao was born in 1961 to Felisa Ortega and writer Ramón Chao, anti-Franco intellectuals who migrated to France to avoid persecution due to their leftist ideals. Initially inspired by punk bands like The Clash and The Jam, Manu and his brother Antoine soon broadened their taste, culminating in the creation of Mano Negra in 1987, an ethnically diverse band of immigrants and descendants of immigrants that played punk, son, ska, flamenco, salsa, Algerian raï, and many other styles. They became fixtures on radio, thanks to eclectic tracks like “Mala Vida” and “Sidi H’Bibi,” which eschewed French and embraced Spanish and Arabic, respectively. Unexpectedly, they became huge.

GIF by Alan Lopez for Remezcla

By 1992, their label pushed them to tour the U.S. and UK, but they decided instead to board a ship across the Atlantic Ocean and play coastal cities in South America; the next year, they embarked on another unconventional tour, boarding a train to play in different Colombian cities during the last days of Pablo Escobar. These tours allowed Manu to engage with Latin American communities up close, know their struggles firsthand, and in many cases, come in contact with radical political groups such as EZLN in Mexico and guerrillas in Colombia.

Manu Chao inhabits a universality that spoke to people, then and now.

According to Peter Culshaw, author of the book Clandestino: In Search Of Manu Chao, Chao became depressed about the dissolution of Mano Negra (and the end of a long term relationship). Manu returned to the band’s last adopted home in Madrid, but not for long. To cure his blues, he hit the road and settled along the way in many countries, including Mexico, Brazil, Senegal, France, and back to Spain; he didn’t have plans to record again, yet he collected ideas and melodies along the way on his laptop, dubbed Estudio Clandestino, with contributions from friends like Mexico’s Tijuana NO and Argentina’s Todos Tus Muertos, as well as his brother Antoine, among others. Manu’s debut solo album began to properly take shape after he met producer Renard Letang, who helped flesh out the arrangements. Originally, it was supposed to be much more electronically influenced, but a bug in Letang’s computer stripped much of these elements from the songs, making the duo re-evaluate their efforts.

Clandestino reflects Manu Chao’s “lost weekend,” with much of the themes of displacement present throughout the record. Rather than focus on autobiography, Chao embodied different characters from his travels, creating an album that reflects the sociopolitical issues of the era. The title track reimagines immigrants as lost souls exiled in Babylon, faceless bandidos making ends meet however they can – their big crime being a lack of legal documentation. In “Desaparecido,” the character proclaims to be lost in the 20th century, on the way to the 21st, wondering where will he arrive. Displacement is common within the worlds of Clandestino, as it examines how globalization has threatened to erase identity and tradition in favor of U.S. cultural imperialism. Manu could be talking about himself, but he inhabits a universality that spoke to people, then and now.

There are no gaps between the tracks, and every song flows like an endless stream of music. After exploring nervous and swinging energy with Mano Negra, Clandestino presented a new element of Manu’s musical talents: a laid-back sound focused on melodies and spare instrumentation. Most of the tracks on Clandestinoare based on reggae rhythms and the majority of the instruments are acoustic; Manu uses similar rhythms and melodies throughout the album, working with a limited palette that allows him to get creative and explore a side of his artistry at the opposite end of Mano Negra. On Clandestino, less is more.

Clandestino established Manu as a compassionate yet rebellious figure who wasn’t afraid to laugh in the face of oppression.

Samples from different radio stations – selected during his travels – function as a window into the outside world. “Mentira” features a sample of a news anchor talking about the Kyoto Conferences on global warming. The next song, “Lágrimas de Oro,” is a salve for a loved one who has no blame for the world being so bad. Tracks like “Welcome To Tijuana” present the duality of life in a border town, where hedonism and death are everyday occurrences. The album is subtitled Esperando La Última Ola, reflecting an almost apocalyptic attitude, yet its melodies and instrumentation suggest an underlying optimism.

Almost from the get-go, Manu Chao has been vocal about the oppression and marginalization of Latin American people, and has been celebrated for doing so. However, at the time, few questioned Manu’s authority to voice these concerns. Throughout Clandestino, Chao assumes the voice of Latin Americans as characters of his songs, as if speaking from their point of view. Considering his European origins, it’s easy to see how today, some may question his role as an outsider who has chosen to express the struggles of oppressed people. That being said, Manu has demonstrated that his commitment to social justice causes is not solely self-serving. While Chao benefited immensely from the globalization of the music industry in the 90s, giving and taking from the supposedly utopic borderless world that the Internet and various world treaties promised, he has consistently been critical of its concomitant imperialism, playing during protests against the G8 and benefits for indigenous rights organizations, among other causes.

GIF by Alan Lopez for Remezcla

It would take a year for Clandestino to pick up commercially. Although some in-the-know radio stations programmed a few songs, no singles were initially released, in part because his label, Virgin, thought it would hurt Manu to heavily promote his album. Touring was out of the question, since there was no band to back him. The record arrived in stores to little fanfare, and was slowly picked up by an audience of hippies, backpackers, audiophiles, and festival goers, who discovered the album by chance and embraced it, spreading the word about the music to any acquaintance who would listen. Joe Strummer, Malcolm McLaren, and Chris Blackwell became vocal fans. Press was also key to its growing influence; prominent Spanish alternative magazine Rock Delux declared it album of the year. A full year later, the album entered the French charts –at first oblivious to the adventures of the frontman of the biggest band in the country’s history – and remained there for four years. Five million copies of Clandestino were sold worldwide. Its legacy is now cemented and has surpassed that of Mano Negra.

Clandestino established Manu as a next-generation Bob Marley: a compassionate yet rebellious figure who wasn’t afraid to laugh in the face of oppression and invite you to love and have a good time. In 1999, EZLN’s Subcomandante Marcos included Chao’s name in his “Musicians Of The World” address, shouting out his support of the Zapatista cause. All this gave Manu newfound confidence. The follow-up to Clandestino, Próxima Estación: Esperanza, arrived in 2001 to greater acclaim. This time, he assembled a band and toured the album, prompting invitations to play at prestigious U.S. festivals like Coachella and Lollapalooza.

GIF by Alan Lopez for Remezcla

His output since has been sporadic at best. After 2007’s La Radiolina, he dropped two songs a full decade later; 2017 also saw the release of the first track from side project ti.po.ta, but that’s been about it. However, Manu’s vision remains unique. He showed that music can speak to everyone no matter the language, as long as the message is loud and compassionate. The Internet has allowed us to have access to any kind of music and in turn has made it possible for artists to come up with different fusions of genres, and a record like Clandestino was a blueprint for how to do it right. While cultural appropriation is (rightfully) denounced whenever someone profits off of music from an oppressed culture while ignoring its originators, Chao has made a career of showing that compassion is key when it comes to making music from different cultures. He learned this from busking, as he told NPR in 2011. “Mano Negra started playing in a subway in Paris before the band started to be known and selling records…The people using the subway in Paris were very eclectic. There were people from a lot of different countries, different cultures. So we have to be able to play all kind of music to please all the people in a subway.” Clandestino is the perfect encapsulation of that principle, giving us one of the most timeless records to be committed to tape.

Friday, October 5, 2018 at 2:18 PM EDT

[audibleaddixion]

Audible Review: Daggarplay Emerges From Their “Subterranean Reality”

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Daggarplay hits us right in the mouth, and hard too. Their latest LP Subterranean Reality is like a drunken shot to the face, that leaves it melting. The production quality is the first thing you’ll notice, the drums are punchy and crisp. Most of the tracks range between 2 and 3 minutes, making them perfect for radio, or your punk rock party playlist. The whole album clocks in at a little over 42 minutes, with a total of 14 hard rocking cuts.

“Red Sky” kicks us off with a huge sounding intro, while it almost a slight punk-a-billy twang to it once it gets swinging. The whole track is instrumental, a cool way to start a record if you ask me, and at just barely over two minutes, those tasty guitar leads leave you hungry for more.

“Cruel Wind Blowing” works a nice build up for it’s intro, before springing to life with a classic punk rock beat, and heavy guitars. A nice prog style breakdown treats us just before the vocals come in, cascading at the bridge with a late key change and a chorus of voices to carry us out.

The inspiring “Don’t Give Up” is the third cut on the LP, and the band again sounds really big, rocking a chunky staccato riff for the verses, before sprawling into an anthemic chorus line. This track gives us the best of everything, from tempo changes to a walk down in the bridge that feels just right.

Daggarplay shows off it’s Ska-Skills on track four, while still maintaining a darker ambiance on “Black River”. The bands the masterful use of minor chord progressions is evident, yet the skippy verses contrast the heavy vocal laden chorus’ very nicely. The spacey lead in the bridge as very tastefully laid into the mix, and we even get a slight key change as the main line comes back in to close it out.

“Girl, It’s Gonna Get Better or Just Worse” is the cheeky track five, that starts off acoustically, and feels a bit like a ballad at first. The band comes in strong as the vocals scream out “They’re taking me away!”

The classic rock leads of “Days Like These” gets you moving again, the heavy palm muted verses build strong into the beefy loud chorus that can’t help but push you to your feet.

The angst riddled vocals of “Four Walls” rage against the feeling of being stuck, but there is a silver lining here. Of course, that silver lining is music. The band laments how music breaks these chains, and it’s hard for me to disagree.

Track eight is where the album takes a bit of Dropkick Murphys, or Flogging Molly kind of turn. This rowdy anthem gets everyone in on the singing during the chorus. I can literally smell the stale beer on the floor from the pub goer’s sloshing mugs as I listen “Kilburn Highroad”.

“Same Old Same Old” continues the pub theme but picks up the tempo just a little bit. We break out of the mundane routine of everyday life with this up-beat pop punk cut. The pace continues to rise as we transition from there into “NW2” with harmony laden chorus’ and guitars like race cars.

We continue to rage against the boredom and monotony of small-town life, with “One Mile Town”. Any of us who grew up in a rural community know this angst all too well. Despite the chip on your shoulder vibe of the cut, it’s still got a very nice hook. The tight drum-bass-guitar work in the verses really stand out to me in this one. We suddenly hit the beach for the bridge when it goes reggae for a few bars before hopping back onto the pop punk train that took us there.

“After Life” rings of Green Day with long harmonies carrying us through each chorus. The verses are tight and choppy, and I really dig the slick guitar leads. The breakdown that is about a third of the way into the song gives the whole thing a very nice polish.

With only two tracks to go you had to know they would be bangers. “Ghosts” is filled with long rolling Goldfinger-esque guitar riffs, loaded with feedback, and a chorus that literally walks us up to the “Edge of Darkness” with a little help from the “Ghost of Despair”.

The whole thing is wrapped up with a nice creepy little bow as we first crank the handle of a sinister old time jack in the box, before “Sinister Blues” blasts into a full on pop punk assault on the playgrounds of the rich.

All in all, for an album that stays this heavy, Subterranean Reality is a fairly-deep listen. My Daggerplay curiosity having been piqued, I’m sure to spend some time in the rabbit hole of familiarizing myself with other solid works from their discography. To any old school 90’s punk rock fans wondering if there was still good underground punk music coming out…..worry no more.

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Two Lions In Love Edition | 6.19 & 6.26.21

Secret Radio | 6.19 & 6.26.21 | Hear it here.

 6/19: Juneteenth “Two Lions in Love Edition”

“Tropical use only” — drug salesperson

1. Daddy Don’t - “Bottom Side of Texas”

One of our favorite spots to play in the whole country is the Pilot Light in Knoxville — it’s not just the club, but the neighborhood and really the whole drive into town, digging into the Tennessee mountains. There’s a little St. Louis in its bricks and pathways too. One evening brought us a night with Daddy Don’t, which was a gal on guitar singing songs about the gal on drums, plus a guy onstage strictly to blow bubbles. They seemed so shy and so completely cool. Their set was hilarious and touching and maybe a little stumbly and thoroughly charismatic. I felt an overlap with Birdcloud and Schwervon and ‘90s Olympia but also definitely their own thing. I hope they’re doing cool stuff these days too.

2. Ennio Morricone - “Guerra e Pace Pollo e Brace” - “Grazie Zie” soundtrack

The great music find from the wedding of Josh and Ashleigh. We spent some time recently remembering what a fantastic time that was…

3. Panjabi MC - “Mundian to Bach Ke”

…because we all met up in Chicago this month to celebrate the marriage of Ren and Kiera! It was in the Morton Arboretum, bringing together both American and Indian families in one grand event. The music throughout the evening was lovely, from the ceremony (Josh on solo guitar) through the early events and the meal. Once the dance floor was opened, however, a whole new flavor dropped: the DJ rocked between Nelly and Indian dancefloor music, then over to Michael Jackson, then into Panjabi MC and on and on. We danced our faces off!

- “Can You Feel the Love Tonight” karaoke version with special guest star!

4. Sparks - “The Number One Song in Heaven”

“Gabriel plays it and God how he plays it!” I know everybody’s gonna be talking about Sparks soon because of the doc that just dropped, and it’ll be both from people who know everything about Sparks and from people who are brand-new zealots. Bring it on — I’m so looking forward to learning more about these guys… especially because, in just over a month, on August 6, there’s going to be a whole other film dropping that we’ve been looking forward to for years. It’s called “Annette,” and it’s directed by Carax, who did “Holy Motors” and “Lovers on the Bridge” — it’s his first movie in English and his first musical. But check this: Sparks wrote all the music! The cast includes Adam Driver, Marion Cotillard, Angèle AND Russell Mael … I mean, we couldn’t be any more excited for this film. It’s entirely possible that it won’t work at all, but it’s also entirely possible that it turns out to be the combined efforts of some of the most interesting artists working today.

5. T.P. Orchestre Poly-Rythmo de Cotonou - “Noude Ma Gnin Tche De Me”

We met up with Theo Welling recently just off Atlantic Avenue at a place with a questionable name and a brothel theme but a pretty epic back patio. Not only were there chandeliers and a disco ball hanging from the broad branches of the tree overhead, but the music was DEAD ON our tastes. When this song came on, it was like: they got us. There was some Francis Bebey a little later on, I mean it was the very stuff. And the thing is, this song totally rocked that patio. Because T.P. rules.

This is from Analog Africa’s crucial T.P. collection, “Echos Hypnotiques.”

6. Elsa - “Ecoutez”

The energy in French records from the ‘60s is crackling hard — this one 

We picked up this record at Dave’s Records when we were in town for Ren and Keira’s wedding. It happened to be Record Store Day as well, so we went to Dave’s Records, an old favorite with a “CDs — Never Had Em, Never Will” sign in the window. “They powered through CDs,” says Paige. That sign is this relic of them living through the ‘90s and ‘00s, really.”

7. Velvet Underground - “White Light/White Heat”

Theo was wearing a Lou Reed Transformer shirt that night and we spent some time talking about this crazy band. I feel like this track is the ultimate experience of VU where they find the most ragged frayed edge of pop music to ride and they spend the whole song there, until the end when they jump on the song like leopards on an antelope and start attacking it. But the song resists, takes off running, and actually gets quite a long ways before it is finally taken down. The ending sounds like a brutal act of nature.

8. Sroeng Sari - “Kuen Kuen Lueng Lueng”

It took me a while to stop and actually listen to this song — the opening riff is kind of blinding. You stare into that riff and think that you’re gonna have to deal with a whole version of “Iron Man,” but on the other side of the riff lies a fascinating new riff and completely independent verse shape. (I have no idea if the lyrics relate to the concept of “Iron Man.”) In fact, it turns out the riff is practically only used like a sample within the structure of the song, and it’s mainly not Iron Man at all. 

9. [REDACTED] Keep an eye out for the Extended Drunk Scarface Cut Edition.

[9. Paige Brubeck as Scarface & Tony S. in - “Favorite Gangster Friend” feat. Chumbawumba]

10. Midnight Oil - “The Power and the Passion”

Paige was a little too late for Midnight Oil, but she’s extremely receptive to an ideologically, ecologically driven band. “If I had heard that band when I was listening to ska music, I would have fuggin loved this band. I think I would have listened to this band a lot. The part of me that likes Reel Big Fish and the Pietasters… it’s very punk and then when the horns come in it’s like, Oh yeah I love this stuff.”

For me: I love the drum solo. It’s such an interesting full-length exploration of a few different ideas, and it helps point out the ways that the percussion operates in Midnight Oil songs. The overdubbed variations on the singer’s voice reminds me of techniques we used in Bound Stems. I really like that way of recording multiple emotions within a single line and just kind of smashing them together for a multi-faceted take on the lyric. I feel like “Jane Says” was the first recording where I noticed that approach. I also love the crescendo structure to the whole song. But to me, this feels like a song that was built to be played live but someone thought should be represented on the album. I think the transitions between the A, B and C parts are weird and unfinished, even though each of the parts is really good.

11. Phuong Dung - “Do Ai”

What a truly incredible voice… and the guitar accompaniment only slowly reveals its depth and litheness through the course of the song.

12. Group Inerane - “Ikabkaban”

This was a lucky discovery. It’s as much a state of mind as a recording of a song. The sound is very live and not ideal, which I do think ultimately makes it more interesting. There’s something about live recordings that can be embarrassing and compromised… or it can feel like lightning in a bottle. I think this one feels special. This sounds to me like desert blues. These are some of the notes on the track itself: “This album by the rebellious Tuareg musicians from Niger is certainly more hypnotic and less ecstatic than the first (which was recorded at a wedding celebration). It should be said that the guitarist Adi Mohamed, who played on the first album, was shot dead in a skirmish between the nomads and junta forces.”

Yow.

13. The Lemon Twigs - “As Long As We’re Together” (video version)

Now I should just say A) this is the video version of the song, and B) that’s the real version of the song as far as I’m concerned. This video is a perfect thing, at least to me. It was directed by Autumn de Wilde, who went on to direct the film “Emma,” which was one of the most enjoyable pieces of art we saw during the pandemic. (She initially got notice as a photographer before going into music videos.) The recording is masterful, with an intentionally pushed back main vocal and all kinds of panned effects both minimal and baroque. These guys were all teens when they wrote and recorded this song with Foxygen’s Jonathan Rado, which only makes it more (annoyingly?) brilliant. Also: this is our candidate for the song likeliest to get stuck in your head.

That video (I love the ending): 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQ4nqnVOfMo

- Nisar Bazmi - “Aesi Chal Main”

Pakistani music from a collection labeled “Folk and Pop Instrumentals 1966-1976.” It’s easy to imagine this as a folk song, but the instrumentation is so radically electric that it feels like new information being learned on the spot.

14. Katty Lane - “Ne Fais Pas La Tête” 

Another live recording. Actually, that’s probably not true: it’s a recording from a TV of a TV appearance that Katty made, almost certainly lip-synching the vocals. But it sounds better than the album version to us. Katty Lane is going for a cross between Nancy Sinatra and Brigitte Bardot, and it’s really interesting how close she gets but how far away she remains.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-T4gWLi5RUw

15. Ezra Furman - “I Lost My Innocence”

Man, the rhythmic arrangement of the opening verse knocks me out. The production on this whole album really, but the minimalist rhythmic clarity that comes from splitting the beat among a variety of instruments is so amazing. As a drummer I just find the pattern-building in this song enviable.

We got to know these songs well during a tour we did with Ezra Furman. The whole band is full of heavy hitters, including Tim Sandusky, the guy who recorded the album and plays a variety of instruments there and live. He’s one of my favorite musical brains, period, and “Transangelic Exodus,” the album this comes from, is one of my favorite pieces of album production, period.

16. Voilaaa - “Pas bon”

These are apparently contemporary people! This album is from 2015. I think Josh pointed us to this one.

17. Francois and the Atlas Mountains - “La Verité”

This a band Paige came across a couple of years ago, at 2222 Jefferson I believe. This chorus is a true tonguetwister and thus irresistable to try to sing along with. The melody is really strong, and check out how the guitar enters the solo!

18. Ata Kak - “Daa Nyinaa”

We had an amazing night in the back patio zone we share with our building. Dexter had a few friends over including a dude named KG who turned out to be super interesting on a variety of subjects. As we were talking about music he brought up Ata Kak, whose “Obaa Sima” we’ve played on here and who we absolutely love. Paige disappeared inside and came back with our tape of this whole album. He fell out, like what are we doing with this thing? I started telling the whole back story of how the album was discovered in a street tent in Ghana by the guy from Awesome Tapes From Africa, and eventually after many adventures actually tracked down Ata Kak, who was surprised to be found and even more surprised to find that the tape Awesome Tapes had found was distorted and ran way faster than originally intended. But then KG started playing that original tempo track, which does indeed sound comPLETely different. I still haven’t been able to find a way to get ahold of that original track. “Daa Nyinaa” is another banger off the same tape. The man just has a really great sense of what makes a hook.

19. Sakuran Zensen - “Taxi Man” 錯乱前戦　タクシーマンのMVです

This was a video that flickered through my feed a couple of years ago, I think thanks to Steve Scariano (not Steve Pick as I claim aloud). I don’t think a single recommendation of Steve Scariano has ever been the wrong answer — the man has impeccable taste. This song has all of the rock and all of the roll PLUS a ladder. It’s a strong song and an even stronger video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNmubstNGFs

20. New York Dolls - “Looking for a Kiss”

As soon as we were in the nasty distortion of Sakuran Zensen it was probably inevitable that we would go looking for the New York Dolls. The live performance of this song is worth the price of admission… and the drummer looks like one of the brothers from The Lemon Twigs!

21. Mina - “La verità”

Sometimes Italian is the only language that will do. It does tend to have its own melodic shapes separate from French. I adore the way she goes for the high notes in the chorus only to get to the climax, which is her dropping down into her lowest register to bitterly and sarcastically deliver the title phrase: “La verità:” “the truth.” I know just enough Italian to catch that her final declaration is “Sono stato io,” or: “It was me.”

22. Pylon - “Cool”

Pylon has been back in the news recently thanks to a big ol’ rerelease at the 40 year mark, and it’s a great way to get more in touch with a band that lies at the source of so much music we love. They are every bit as cool as the song.

23. Dalida - “Aghani Aghani”

Dalida is Egyptian born, in an Italian household, who first gained fame singing in French — or in Italian to French audiences. She ended up singing in 10 languages in all. She is a blockbuster French star with no parallel, though she died young by her own hand. “Aghani Aghani” is an Arabic medley that became a gigantic hit all across the Arab world and has since entered the fabric of the language and culture.

24. Betti-Betti & T.P. Orchestre Poly Rythmo de Cotonou - “Mbala”

We have been falling deeper and deeper for Betti-Betti’s songs. This one has so many of my favorite things that she does — the fantastic melodies that cycle past each other, the expressive horn lines, and the mouth percussion that totally transforms the song for me. We just recently got a different album of hers that we’re also really excited about; that one features an entirely different band in a different style. This one is T.P. though, those consummate collaborators, and this song is an epic joining of forces.

- Mulatu Astatke + Black Jesus Experience - “Mulatu”

25. Nick Drake - “Pink Moon”

Oh that strawberry moon with its red halo.