Sometimes nothing hits my ears, and my heart, more sweetly than a new track that reminds me of the chiming, charming college rock when I regularly roamed the poster-covered walls of my beloved radio alma mater. “A Fake Idea,” the … Continue reading This Week’s Model — Hurry, “A Fake Idea”
The new album from the Danish band Iceage finds them on a sonic journey that used to be fairly commonplace. Among the titans of college rock who ruled the left end of the dial through the nineteen-eighties, there are a … Continue reading The New Releases Shelf — Seek Shelter
353. Meat Puppets, Mirage (1987) Meat Puppets spent the first chunk of the nineteen-eighties making music almost relentlessly. They churned out recordings with speed and aplomb, then followed those with lengthy tours. About the only think that could slow their … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 1000, 1979 – 1989 — #353 to #351
Count me among those who thought Sleater-Kinney’s 2019 album, The Center Won’t Hold, was utterly fantastic. I know the churlish consensus is that the beloved band misstepped in adopting some of the ideas proffered by their famous producer, or perhaps … Continue reading This Week’s Model — Sleater-Kinney, “Worry With You”
Like a Stone, the new album from the Philadelphia band Remember Sports, gave me a beloved sensation that is all too rare for me now. It took me back to my college radio days — both iterations — when a band … Continue reading The New Releases Shelf — Like a Stone
356. Translator, No Time Like Now (1983) When 415 Records, an independent label based in San Francisco, inked a distribution deal with Columbia Records, Translator was the first act they brought to the newly accessible masses. Heartbeats and Triggers, Translator’s … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 1000, 1979 – 1989 — #356 to #354
There are few things more insidious than the systemized retribution against survivors of sexual harassment who speak the truth of their experiences. When several women came forward to detail the serial abuse perpetrated by a British musician, he drew upon … Continue reading This Week’s Model — Solidarity Not Silence, “This Is Sisterhood”
These posts are about the songs that fell just short of crossing the key line of chart success, entering the Billboard Top 40. Every song featured in this series peaked at number 41. The first song that Beatles took to … Continue reading Top 40 Smash Near Misses — “From Me to You”
This series of posts covers my long, beloved history interacting with the medium of radio, including the music that flowed through the airwaves. During my college radio days, we were always hungry to hear as much new music as possible. … Continue reading Radio Days — Certain Damage
359. The B-52’s, Mesopotamia (1982) After two full-length studio albums, the B-52’s had exhausted their backlog of original songs. Gary Kurfirst, the band’s manager, insisted that shouldn’t stop them from getting to work on a third record. His urgency to … Continue reading College Countdown: CMJ Top 1000, 1979 – 1989 — #359 to #357
Coffee for Two 