Friday, June 30, 2006

Dave's I-Pod Top 'O The Charts for the end of June

1. "Handshake Drugs" - Wilco
2. "Danville Girl" - Dock Boggs
3. "Caleb Meyer" - Gillian Welch
4. "What Did You Think" - Kelly Willis
5. "Beautiful Sorta" - Ryan Adams
6. "Whiskey Bottle" - Uncle Tupelo
7. "A Hard Day's Night" - The Beatles
8. "Tiny Dancer" - Elton John
9. "I Hear A Sweet Voice Calling" - The Handsome Family
10. "Train of Love" Kenny Vaughan
11. "Molly's Chambers" - Kings of Leon
12. "Homicide" - Skid Marks w/ Sally Timms
13. "Seven Nation Army" - The White Stripes
14. "Man in the Box" - Alice In Chains
15. "It Makes No Difference" - The Band
16. "Professor Booty" - The Beastie Boys
17. "Are You Sure Hank Done it This Way?" - Waylon Jennings
18. "Loser" - Beck
19. "True" - Spandau Ballet
20. "Cry A While" - Bob Dylan
21. "Star of Bethlehem" - Neil Young
22. "Please Take the Devil Out of Me" - Caitlin Cary
23. "Those Three Days" - Lucinda Williams
24. "I've Been Deceived" - Charlie Feathers
25. "Immigrant Song" - Led Zeppelin
26. "Oh Girl" - The Chi-Lights
27. "Back in Love Again" - LTD
28. "Sweet Jane" The Cowboy Junkies
29. "Love Will Tear Us Apart" - Joy Division
30. "Highway 99" - Dave Alvin & The Guilty Men
31. "I'll Take My Sorrow Straight" - Iris DeMent
32. "It Would Be a Doggone Lie" - Deke Dickerson
33. "If You Don't Know Me By Now" - Harold Melvin and The Bluenotes
34. "Sultans of Swing" - Dire Straits
35. "She" - Gram Parsons
36. "Buckaroo" - Don Rich
37. "The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald" - Gordon Lightfoot
38. "Tulsa Queen" - Emmylou Harris
39. "You've Never Seen Me Cry" - The Flatlanders
40. "I Can't Stand the Rain" - Ann Peebles

Tuesday, June 20, 2006

Death by Radio

TWANG!
How radio is erasing our history
By David Rey

Commercial radio has almost killed off our collective cultural memory and in its place substituted the forgettable, the unobtrusive and the emotionless fare that passes for audio entertainment on you car stereo dial.

I’m not talking about the top-40 or hot hits stations – which play the rap or Blink-182-ish flavor of the week. That kind of stuff is important – kids need their own music, be it bad or good in quality.

I’m talking about these stations that try to pass themselves off as “classic rock,” “oldies” and “country.”

I’ll start the tirade with an assault on radio’s worst station genre, the so-called “classic rock” purveyors. These stations are the first part of the machine that has been erected to make us eventually forget that “Rubber Soul,” “Blonde on Blonde,” “Exile on Main Street,” and “Pet Sounds” ever existed.

Number one rule of classic rock: Never play anything off of those four albums.

I’m positive they tell new DJs: “You may play Wings in place of the Beatles. You may not ever play anything John Lennon created apart from The Beatles except “Imagine” – and then only on really sad days.”

Furthermore, “Bob Dylan does not exist except in his funny faux-stoner creation, “Rainy Day Woman #12 and 35.’”

And, “You will be instantly fired if anything except “Tumbling Dice” is ever played off of “Exile.’”

The Rolling Stones catalog is probably given more latitude than any other on-the-edge-of-control group – but the constant playing of “Brown Sugar” and “Start Me Up” is a bit ridiculous. More “Rocks Off” and “Jumping Jack Flash” please.

In place of these monumental creations, the classic rock stations have erected once-an-hour odes to Kansas and their horrible “Dust in the Wind.”

You’d think Jethro Tull was the biggest band in rock history given the sheer number of times they play their best known song, “Aqualung.”

And the origin of this rant comes from the fact that I got out of my car at lunch in the middle of ZZ Top’s “Legs” and when I got back into my car to go pick up my wife after work, “Legs” greeted me as I turned on the ignition.

There are at least 10,000 classic rock possibilities, and these jokers are playing one of ZZ Top’s worst songs twice in less than four hours. Sheesh – ever heard of “Jesus Just Left Chicago” for Pete’s sake?

Get rid of the icons and innovators and flood the airwaves with Def Leppard, Boston, The Eagles, Bad Co., The Scorpions and, God save us, Bob Seger.

While the classic rock stations are busy erasing late 60s songs from your memory, the oldies stations have already succeeded in eliminating the originators of rock and roll from their playlists completely.

I’ve never heard Carl Perkins on an oldies station.

Johnny Cash? Isn’t he that country feller?

Chuck Berry? Bo Diddley? Buddy Holly?

What do I hear when I listen?

Gerry and the Pacemakers. The Association. Frankie Valli. And that lousy Big Bopper song every single day.

Hair salon music is what it is – music to cut hair and gossip to.

Elvis’ “That’s All Right Mama” may cause manicure injuries or hair dye imperfections.

It’s much safer to play one of his schlocky 60s songs.

Now I’ve worked myself into such a titter that I’m afraid of what I’ll say about country stations.

So I’ll leave it at “Play more Waylon!”

Friday, June 16, 2006

Dave's I-Pod Top O' the Charts for early June

1. "The Hardest Part" - Ryan Adams
2. "Baby Did a Bad Bad Thing" - Chris Isaak
3. "Cocaine Blues" - Johnny Cash
4. "Thirteen" - Johnny Cash
5. "Crystal Frontier" - Calexico
6. "Revelator" - Gillian Welch
7. "Everybody Knows This Is Nowhere" - Neil Young
8. "Pack Up Your Sorrows" - Bruce Robison/Kelly Willis
9. "Wreck of the Old 97" - Hank Williams III
10. "Making Waves" - Golden Smog
11. "Drunk By Noon" - The Handsome Family
12. "He Don't Care About Me" - Kelly Willis
13. "Still I Long for Your Kiss" - Lucinda Williams
14. "Last To Know" - Alejandro Escovedo
15. "All the Way Home" - Bruce Springsteen
16. "Roses Are Blooming" - The Hollisters
17. "Lonely Girls" - Lucinda Williams
18. "Chin Up, Cheer Up" - Ryan Adams
19. "I've Been a Long Time Leaving" - Waylon Jennings
20. "The Late Greats" - Wilco
21. "Nobody 'Cept You" - Bob Dylan
22. "Dull Edge of the Blade" - The Derailers
23. "Miserlou" - Dick Dale and His Del-Tones
24. "To West Texas" - Explosions in the Sky
25. "Do You Know How It Feels?" - The Flying Burrito Brothers
26. "He Stopped Loving Her Today" - George Jones
27. "The Shallow End" - Grant Lee Buffalo
28. "I'll Make Believe She is You" - Jeff Tweedy
29. "Folsom Prison Blues" - Johnny Cash
30. "Solitary Man" - Johnny Cash
31. "Sleepwalk" - Los Straitjackets
32. "Guitar Town" - Steve Earle
33. "Something in the Air" - Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers
34. "Jacksonville Skyline" - Whiskeytown
35. "James Alley Blues (Live)" - Wilco
36. "It's a Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock and Roll)" - AC/DC
37. "A New Shade of Blue" - The Bobby Fuller Four
38. "Radar Gun" - The Bottle Rockets
39. "Behind Closed Doors" - Charlie Rich
40. "Thousand Miles From Nowhere" - Dwight Yoakam