I had a few unofficial rules when I assembled my shows during my college radio days. One of the oddest was this: when in doubt, look to the H’s. That’s the section of the library that I generally gravitated to when I was momentarily at a loss as to what to play next. This may be in part because my most dependable standby, Robyn Hitchcock, had an impressive bevy of albums there in the music stacks, but there were other performers there, like Husker Du and Hunters and Collectors and the Housemartins, who were equally well-equipped to help turn the … Continue reading One for Friday: Hoodoo Gurus, “Come Anytime”

I don’t really like Christmas music. I did when I was a kid. Like a lot of kids, I suppose, I was always pretty happy when the calendar pages flipped up to the point where it was reasonable to pull the worn copies of Christmas albums out of the stacks and starting giving them regular airplay, usually on the big console stereo of my grandparents, the one that allowed for six or seven big black discs to be stacked up on top of the spindle, waiting for their chance to plummet to the turntable and start spreading cheer. That affection … Continue reading One for Friday: Will & the Bushmen, “Blow Me Up”