I was a kid who favored albums over singles, operating with a snobbish certainty that the truest test of an artist’s mettle was whether or not they could come up with two long vinyl sides of new music on a fairly regular basis. That was somewhat of a reflection of the time as 45s were increasingly difficult to come by except for those prone to combing the teeny, isolated part of the record store devoted to underground punk. Even though the Billboard Top 40 had an indisputable cachet, albums were the consensus measure of which performers were truly important. Sure, … Continue reading One for Friday: The Wedding Present, “Pleasant Valley Sunday”

I remember Poi Dog Pondering’s debut album arriving at the college radio station amidst a lot of expectation. This was back when the number of outlets available to promote a new record were far more limited than in the case now, so I’m not quite sure how we got it in our heads that this was a release immediately worthy of my attention. It may have been as simple as the band’s unique gestation. Athens, Georgia and Minneapolis, Minnesota were well-represented on our airwaves, but we weren’t playing a lot from groups that got their start in Hawaii. They did … Continue reading One for Friday: Poi Dog Pondering, “Spending the Day in the Shirt You Wore”

I think all of us toiling together in college radio had our favorite obscure performers, those who didn’t burn up any charts, including those our our own station, but whose every new release filled us with excitement. Often, these weren’t necessarily even performers who we felt had created masterpieces previously, but who instead always seemed to have the chance to create a absolutely fantastic album lurking within them. My whole time as a student DJ at 90FM, I was dead certain that Sam Phillips had an absolutely fantastic album lurking within her. The fact that it technically came out after … Continue reading One for Friday: Sam Phillips, “Baby I Can’t Please You”

Even back in the late eighties, we knew Julian Cope was one of the relentlessly weird ones. And I’m not even sure he’d done all that much to earn that reputation by that point. Certainly, some amount of trepidation could be stirred up with his music, first with the post-punk band The Teardrop Explodes and then his solo career, which still felt relatively new at that point. The music was slick pop, but delivered in a way that was angular, aggressive and practically oozing serpentine showmanship. He had the veneer of a dangerous man who happened to have a way … Continue reading One for Friday: Julian Cope, “Five O’Clock World”

Typically this space is devoted to songs that embedded themselves into my music fan psyche when I was working at the college radio station during my time as an undergraduate student at the University of Wisconsin – Stevens Point. However, I had another tour of duty with student-run radio, serving as the advisor and General Manager for several years at WPRK-FM at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida. When I started the job, it was a major transition in many respects, not the least of which was the relocation from America’s Dairyland to the Sunshine State. The first time we … Continue reading One for Friday: Superchunk, “Florida’s on Fire”

Where do I even begin with Shane MacGowan? The former and eventually reinstated lead singer of the Pogues always seemed like a likely casualty of himself, burning out from hard living that was exacerbated by live performance venue green rooms well stocked with beer and liquor. Through the late nineteen-eighties and early nineties, whenever the band got a prime showcase to perform, say on Saturday Night Live, MacGowan wavered on stage like a slender bamboo pole in a brisk wind. By all indications he lived his life according to the credo suggested by the title of a 1942 Louis Jordan … Continue reading One for Friday: Shane MacGowan and the Popes, “That Woman’s Got Me Drinking”

It’s interesting the way that certain performers hold onto their fame forever, even after death, and how some completely fade away, even if their music survives. Dying young has made so many rock ‘n’ roll stars into permanent icons–Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison, Kurt Cobain–and yet there are those who rarely get a mention, the untimely ends somehow escaping romanticized sadness. Michael Hutchence of INXS was only thirty-seven when he died, just a few years after becoming a full-fledged sex symbol when his band’s album Kick turned into a huge blockbuster. What’s more, his death was ruled a suicide, … Continue reading One for Friday: Max Q, “Way of the World”

Once the Academy Awards ridiculously came up with only two final nominees for the Original Song category, plenty of people were quick to respond with dismay, disgruntlement or downright animosity. It was evidence of a broken system or simply final confirmation that the category was entirely outdated, a relic of a different era of Hollywood when even the most serious-minded film found a way to wedge a number into the proceedings (there were fourteen songs competing at the 1945 Oscars). Then once the Academy announced that they had no intention of having either of the songs performed live on awards … Continue reading One for Friday: David Bowie, “Real Cool World”

When I got my first job in commercial radio, it was at a “New Rock Alternative” station, which was terminology intended to convey that while we were going to play the biggest of the big when it came to college radio material, artists that sounded like Pearl Jam were going to have a far easier time muscling onto our playlist. My hope was that I’d be able to stay up on music through working there. After all, we were primarily playing the artists that college radio broke in the first place. How far behind could we be? The issue, as … Continue reading One for Friday: The Apples in Stereo, “Show the World”

Sometimes I really struggle to figure out which song to post from an individual album. Especially when I’m pulling from an obscure album, I have a strong instinct to select a song that doesn’t seem to be readily available otherwise. I’m continually surprised by how much of the pop culture flotsam and jetsam of years gone by has found its way to information superhighway, and yet there’s still all sorts of material that is circling aimlessly, hunting for an on-ramp. If I’m going to post a song from an album that seems to mainly perplex Amazon and doesn’t merit its … Continue reading One for Friday: Stump, “Charlton Heston”