College rock in the nineteen-eighties was full of bands that provided a sonic echo of the jangly R.E.M. sound and the nineties was dominated by groups emulating the sludgy assault that was forged by Mudhoney, perfected by Nirvana and turned into a slicked up commodity by Pearl Jam. Those styles were so dominant that it’s easy to forget that there were other bands that were inspiring adherents, including a few fairly unlikely ones. Legend has it that a tour through the Midwest undertaken by the Red Hot Chili Peppers in the mid-eighties is what led to the formation of the … Continue reading One for Friday: Royal Crescent Mob, “5 More Minutes”

I wish I could claim to be one of those kids who was wisely immersing myself in the jagged, angsty splendor of the likes of Joy Division and Jesus and Mary Chain. I wasn’t, though. Most of my record collection was taken up by the same touchstones of regrettable pop conformity that were on a lot of teenage bedroom shelves in the mid-eighties, or so the sales figures and MTV airplay assured me. These records were so resoundingly mediocre that I can’t even impose a retroactive, post-ironic coolness on them. I had the capacity for a more sophisticated musical palette, … Continue reading One for Friday: Stealin’ Horses, “Turnaround”

If my rough tally is correct, this is the 150th installment of the One for Friday feature in this space, including the spectacular “Week of Fridays” event in the spring. The name of this weekly exercise in music sharing doesn’t necessarily make all that much sense now. It was a riff on the Friday distraction I used to deploy over on my LiveJournal site. “Five for Friday” made a little more sense, what with that alliterative ring to it. I’d come up with some fairly broad prompt for a music-based list, pop up the five best examples that sprung to … Continue reading One for Friday: Iam Siam, “Talk to Me (Can You Hear Me Now)”