March 29, 2010 - The Best of 2009......Part ONE

John and I have been discussing doing a "best of 2009" show for awhile now. Bad weather, car problems, vacations and hard drive mishaps, among other things kept pushing the best of show back. Last week was going to be the week we finally got to it, but we devoted the entire show to Alex Chilton instead.


This week was finally the week, but instead of narrowing it down to a top 10 or something, I sent John enough music for at least two and maybe even three shows. John played some of his favorite music from 2009 (if you are a regular listener you know that John's best of list and my best of list are both very different from each other). About 8:25pm he played the "Donohue Theme" and we were off! This is what I played (with the album also listed, for a change):


The Smithereens - Pinball Wizard from The Smithereens Play "Tommy"
The Spongetones - Karma Depleted from Scambled Eggs
The Offbeat - Someday Somehow from To The Rescue
Tickled Pink - Workaday World from Tickled Pink
The Doughboys - Sidetracked Again from Act Your Rage
The Disciplines - Wrong Lane from Smoking Kills

The Tripwires - Drawing A Blank from House To House
The Soundtrack Of Our Lives - The Fan Who Wasn't There from Communion
Matthew Sweet & Susanna Hoffs - Willin' from Under The Covers Vol.2
Jason Falkner - Evangeline from All Quiet On The Noise Floor
Robin Hitchcock - What You Is from Goodnight Oslo
Jamie & Steve - Let's Don't Count This One from English Afterthoughts


After my segment was done, John played his interview with Patrick Park. Next week John will have a guest live in the studio with Celeste Starchild. Because of this, I will be sliding back into the 9om slot for next week's show and will continue on with more of my 2009 favorites.

March 22, 2010 - Sitting in the Back Of A Car.......listening to Alex Chilton

Last Tuesday I started to think about what this week's show would be. Back in February, John had talked about doing a "best of 2009" show. I decided that now was a good time to finally do that, so I started putting the music together. On Wednesday night I heard that Alex Chilton, who had a #1 hit at age 16, had passed away at age 59. On Thursday morning John asked me to play some Alex Chilton on this week's show. We decided to dedicate the entire show to the frontman of The Box Tops and Big Star.


Big Star had been scheduled to close this year's SXSW on Saturday night, three days after his death. The show became a Big Star Tribute show with Big Star members Jody Stephens, Jon Auer & Ken Stringfellow sharing the stage with original member Andy Hummel plus many others, including Curt Kirkwood, M Ward, Chris Stamey, Mike Mills, Evan Dando, Chuck Prophet, John Doe & Susan Cowsill.


As an added bonus for the show, Ken Stringfellow was kind enough to take time out of his day on Monday to give John an interview. He talked about his experiences with Alex Chilton and Big Star and was very gracious to talk to John while he was clearly still mourning the loss of his friend.


John started the show with his opening track, Dennis Diken's I've Been Away. After that, the rest of the show was dedicated to Alex Chilton He started off with these tracks:


The Box Tops - The Letter
The Box Tops - Soul Deep
The Box Tops - (The) Happy Song
The Replacements - Alex Chilton
Matthew Sweet & Susanna Hoffs - Back Of A Car
Big Star - September Gurls
The Posies - What's Going Ahn


At this point, John played the interview that he had done that afternoon with Ken Stringfellow. When the interview was over John played the Donohue theme and we continued with these tunes:


Big Star - In The Street
The Box Tops - Cry Like A Baby
Big Star - Back Of A Car
Alex Chilton - Boogie Shoes
Big Star - Hung Up With Summer
Tommy Keene - Hey Little Child
The Loud Family - Back Of A Car
The Box Tops - The Letter
Big Star - Holocaust
Big Star - Jesus Christ
Game Theory - You Can't Have Me
Big Star - Turn My Back On The Sun
Alex Chilton - She's The One Who's Got It
Big Star - Back Of A Car (Live)
Ken Stringfellow - Take Care
Big Star - Thirteen
Big Star - You Can't Have Me
Big Star - Lady Sweet
Big Star - When My Baby's Beside Me
Big Star - Doany
Big Star - September Gurls


We played FOUR different versions of Back Of A Car, TWO different versions of You Can't Have Me and both The Letter and September Gurls were played twice. I also tried to play Big Star's Mine Exclusively, but John couldn't find it. Next week I'll most likely go back to the "best of 2009" show that I originally had planned for this week. See you then...

March 8, 2010....Today's my birthday, I'm.......Forty-Four!

Last week Independents Uncovered celebrated birthday number two and tonight I celebrated birthday number 44. That was as good a reason as any to have a "celebration" on the show. Unfortunately for me, John sang "Happy Birthday" to me in his worst...I mean best Marilyn Monroe impersonation. But the rest of the show went well, so who am I to complain?


I had dinner plans for my b-day, but it was a late dinner, so to make everything work, I went on early. John played his opening song (Dennis Diken's I've Been Away) and then played both the Donohue theme and the ONniversary song and we were off. John had asked me what my theme was and I told him I had no theme. All I did was pick some music that I wanted to hear. So this is what I wanted to hear:


Moxy Fruvous - Big Fish
The Residents - Forty-Four
Warren Zevon - I'll Sleep When I'm Dead
The BB's - A Chance
The Good Rats - Songwriter
John Hiatt - Have A Little Faith In Me
French, Frith, Kaiser, Thompson - Drowned Dog, Black Night
Continental Drifters - Meet On The Ledge
Warren Zevon - Roland The Headless Thompson Gunner
dada - Dim
Don Dixon - Your Sister Told Me
Roger Glover & Friends - Love Is All


Although there was not "theme", some of the songs definitely fit together. The first 3 songs fit together for me. The main character in Big Fish is names Mike. One of the lines in Forty-Four is the title of this week's post. And based on the amount of sleep that I have been getting, I'll Sleep When I'm Dead seemed very appropriate.


The next group of songs fit together in my "songwriter" category. When Lou Luca first played A Chance for me, I knew he had something special. It's a great song about wanting to be a star. Peppi Marchello's songwriter is also a great song about wanting to make it. And John Hiatt's Have A Little Faith In Me is just a great song, period! It may be my favorite song of his and it fit very well with the other two.


Richard Thompson & Warren Zevon both mine the dark side and those two songs fit well. I threw in the Richard Thompson penned Fairport Convention cover just to break it up a little. And the final song of the night, Love Is All, seemed like a good way to end it. The centerpiece of the Children's album The Butterfly Ball and Grasshopper's Feast is sung by Ronnie James Dio and seemed like a very uplifting way to end my part of the show.


I left for my dinner plans about 3/4 of the way through my segment, which meant that I didn't get to hear the rest of the show. I'm sure John did a good job the rest of the way. I want to thank all the people who wished me well on my birthday and everyone who listened to the show. I heard from Kirsten, Kevin, Lou, Cat, Sammy, Tam, Liz and Maggie during the show. Thank you to all of you and thanks to whoever else was listening. John is out of the country next week, so there will be no show. We'll be back on the 22nd and maybe I'll have a surprise or two lined up!

March 1, 2010 - All roads lead to.....Hate!

I tried something a little different for this week. I went back to a specific theme and that theme was the word "hate". Every song I played hat the word hate in the title. It wasn't originally planned that way but the first couple songs had hate in the title and from there I just went with it.


Over the weekend John announced on facebook what I would be doing and a couple people questoned the "subject matter". I think this was a good way of showing that hate is not necessarily a bad thing and just because a song had a negative word in the title, that doesn't mean it is a negative song. Some of the songs were downright uplifting! Maybe one day I'll do a "love" show and I'm sure some of those songs will be more depressing and negative than most of these "hate" songs.


As usual, I sent John more songs than I would need. Then right before the show started I remembered the song Hatred, by The Kinks. I sent it to John but he was unable to download it, so that gem of "brotherhood love" will have to wait for another day. I still had 19 songs to choose from which was more than enough. But John didn't have a guest lined up and decided that even though I came on at 8:20, that I was going to go to the end of the show. We played all 19 songs and ended the show a couple minutes before 10pm. Here's what we played:


The Montgomerys - I Hate Everything Today
Sloan - I Hate My Generation
All - I Hate To Love
Cracker - I Hate My Generation
Graham Parker - Turn It Into Hate
Stephen Bruton - Hate To Love
Will Ray - I Hate My Day Job
Episode Six - Love Hate Revenge
The Posies - Hate Song

Saturday Morning Pictures - It's Cool To Hate The Singer
The Pursuit Of Happiness - Hate Engine
Young Fresh Fellows - New Day I Hate
The Libertines - Campaign Of Hate
Hüsker Du - Hate Paper Doll
Little Feat - Hate To Lose Your Lovin'
Chris Mars - Hate It
The Hives - Hate To Say I Told You So
Shoes - Hate To Run
The Posies - I May Hate You Sometimes


We had 2 different songs called I Hate My Generation and two songs with "hate to love" in the title. Very interesting. The show went over pretty well and I think the experiment was a success. Independents Uncovered turns 2 this week and next Monday is my birthday, so I'm sure the show will be a memorable one. At this point I'm not even sure what time I'll be doing the show, or even if I'll make it at all. But the music will be there with or without me and I'm sure I'll be able to squeeze it into my busy schedule somewhere. Till then....