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[music] Retro Song of the Day
Mar. 24th, 2011 12:35 pmI remember hearing this on WAAF all the time and thinking it was one of the most AWESOME songs ever.
I remember hearing this on WAAF all the time and thinking it was one of the most AWESOME songs ever.
Today's music while working at home courtesy of 1987. I'd forgotten how much I enjoyed Pleased to Meet Me, I haven't listened to it in ages! (Which, btw, eMusic somehow made a deal with WEA (or Warners, or whatever that distributor's called now), which means the 'Mats stuff is FINALLY available there. I think I know what my next major download session will be, considering that I'm woefully low on drunken Minneapolis punk. :)
So let's see...end of sophomore year in high school and start of junior year...meeting up with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
head58 again after briefly hanging with him in jr high...working at the YMCA as a hall monitor/gofer/tidy-upper/babysitter (trust me, a locker room full of little nits post-swim class can get loud and dangerous)...finishing off the IWN after three years, contemplating starting a sequel...the start of a few dead-end stories (and continual work on Dream Weaver from '86)...class trips into Boston, one in which head58, myself and a few others get lost on the T and ride it out to Riverside and back...hanging around with Kevin in our computer class...writing music reviews for the school paper, LRS(aka Little Red Schoolhouse, for you non-Athol people)...staying up late on Sunday nights to watch 120 Minutes (I believe this was just before their Sunday night line up of Young Ones, Python and Comic Strip)...the start of listening to WAMH incessantly, taping all kinds of stuff off the radio, pre-comp tape era...Substance, Happy?, Music for the Masses, Strangeways, Here We Come...joining Columbia House...head58's infamous sniper game that nearly gave my mom a heart attack...ah, fun days. :)
So let's see...end of sophomore year in high school and start of junior year...meeting up with
head58 again after briefly hanging with him in jr high...working at the YMCA as a hall monitor/gofer/tidy-upper/babysitter (trust me, a locker room full of little nits post-swim class can get loud and dangerous)...finishing off the IWN after three years, contemplating starting a sequel...the start of a few dead-end stories (and continual work on Dream Weaver from '86)...class trips into Boston, one in which head58, myself and a few others get lost on the T and ride it out to Riverside and back...hanging around with Kevin in our computer class...writing music reviews for the school paper, LRS(aka Little Red Schoolhouse, for you non-Athol people)...staying up late on Sunday nights to watch 120 Minutes (I believe this was just before their Sunday night line up of Young Ones, Python and Comic Strip)...the start of listening to WAMH incessantly, taping all kinds of stuff off the radio, pre-comp tape era...Substance, Happy?, Music for the Masses, Strangeways, Here We Come...joining Columbia House...head58's infamous sniper game that nearly gave my mom a heart attack...ah, fun days. :)
Still Preoccupied with 1985
Nov. 5th, 2009 10:34 amSo today's music is courtesy of 1985, due to a hankering for Seventh Dream of Teenage Heaven (which just finished)...so now I'm listening to Meat Is Murder, which I haven't listened to in AGES because I've always thought it was the Smiths' weakest album, and on deck is The Head on the Door, the twin EPs of Tiny Dynamine and Echoes in a Shallow Bay, and some random Depeche Mode singles.
So what was I doing all those years ago...? Finishing up junior high and starting freshman year in high school, hanging out with friends downtown (oddly enough our favorite hangout was in front of the library), I'd gone out with (and quickly broken up with) my first two girlfriends, my moodiness was kicking in, I'd soon accidentally discover college radio after a brief obsession with jazz, I'd be on the first soccer team my high school had in years, I'd discover the hilarity that is the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series...all sorts of things.
Of course, chances are, this playlist will probably scooch over to 1986 (I've already thrown Standing on a Beach, the cassette version with the b-sides, on there, and will probably throw more Smiths on there if I have time).
Yeah, I know. I should just shut up about all this retro music and write a damn book about it already. :p
So what was I doing all those years ago...? Finishing up junior high and starting freshman year in high school, hanging out with friends downtown (oddly enough our favorite hangout was in front of the library), I'd gone out with (and quickly broken up with) my first two girlfriends, my moodiness was kicking in, I'd soon accidentally discover college radio after a brief obsession with jazz, I'd be on the first soccer team my high school had in years, I'd discover the hilarity that is the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series...all sorts of things.
Of course, chances are, this playlist will probably scooch over to 1986 (I've already thrown Standing on a Beach, the cassette version with the b-sides, on there, and will probably throw more Smiths on there if I have time).
Yeah, I know. I should just shut up about all this retro music and write a damn book about it already. :p
Happy Halloween!
Oct. 30th, 2009 09:17 pmA little Halloween treat from 71 years ago today... :)
Thanks to Daily Kos' Bill in Portland ME for reminding me of this, and the Internet Archive (who, as fate would have it, have their offices here in my new neighborhood!) for having this available here for embedding as well as download.
This is one of the most brilliant events in radio history, IMO--if anything, listen between 15:00 and 20:00 for my favorite and creepiest parts...damn fine creative directing there!
There you go, way too fast
Oct. 27th, 2009 07:39 amWith my current obsession with the station Channel 92.3 (which I have to say is bordering on my past obsession with WAMH), I have to say I'm kind of surprised by some of their light rotation songs...I understand they're going all retro by throwing older songs (read: alt.rock songs from my high school years) into the mix like "Love Will Tear Us Apart", "Inbetween Days" and the like, but it kind of surprises me that lately they've been playing "Crash" by the Primitives! It's the '95 remix version from the Dumb and Dumber soundtrack and has some goofy half-assed guitar licks thrown on it, but still...pleasantly surprised that they're playing a great song from back in the day that is criminally forgotten now! :)
[Weekend] Sunday Grooves
Aug. 23rd, 2009 02:58 pmYeah, I know, I'm posting enough today that I should just be done with it and Twitter/Facebook it instead. :p
But still...listening to Radio Alice online, specifically their "Chill" substation, and really enjoying it. Very mellow, very relaxing, especially now that Emm just made me some coffee with the press. They just played Air's "All I Need", and previously played Dubstar and Dead Can Dance. Very interesting switch from the stuff we were listening to on Classic Live 105 (love the station, but unfortunately they only play the same damn songs all the time).
On a side note, given our ADD with TV and radio lately, we may contemplate doing Sirius' Internet Radio for $12.95 a month. Not a bad deal, really, and we can just play it using Windows Media Player. Would be well worth it, come to think of it...given that I love listening to radio but don't have a decent working radio at my desk at the moment...and also given that every car we've rented on our trips had it and we found all our favorite new stuff on it...more on this later!
But still...listening to Radio Alice online, specifically their "Chill" substation, and really enjoying it. Very mellow, very relaxing, especially now that Emm just made me some coffee with the press. They just played Air's "All I Need", and previously played Dubstar and Dead Can Dance. Very interesting switch from the stuff we were listening to on Classic Live 105 (love the station, but unfortunately they only play the same damn songs all the time).
On a side note, given our ADD with TV and radio lately, we may contemplate doing Sirius' Internet Radio for $12.95 a month. Not a bad deal, really, and we can just play it using Windows Media Player. Would be well worth it, come to think of it...given that I love listening to radio but don't have a decent working radio at my desk at the moment...and also given that every car we've rented on our trips had it and we found all our favorite new stuff on it...more on this later!
A video for head58...
May. 30th, 2009 02:49 pm...who will probably be the only other person who remembers this song from 1988. :p
I know this is a 1985 version, but still...Kurt Valaquen/Harland looks so YOUNG there... O_o
I know this is a 1985 version, but still...Kurt Valaquen/Harland looks so YOUNG there... O_o
RTS Presents: Saturday Morning Pop Music
Aug. 25th, 2007 09:04 amI don't know what's happening, but for some odd reason I'm finding myself liking a lot of the poppier Top 40 stuff that VH1 is playing. emmalyon and I have been watching their morning video shows and the Top 20 Video Countdown almost every Saturday for the past few months, and quite enjoying it. And I haven't enjoyed pop music this much since the mid 80s, and it's kind of freaking me out. It's not as if I don't have access to alternative music anymore (I thank Live 105, KFOG and Alice 97.3 for that), but damn it, I'm a nonconformist! I'm not supposed to like pop music! It goes against my nature! [/snark]
Cases in point:
Justin Timberlake, "Lovestoned/I Think She Knows"--damn it, this is funky, and it's full of 80s-style human-beatbox goodness. Probably the same reason I actually had NSYNC's "Pop" on single for awhile.
Nelly Furtado, "Do It"--tell me this isn't a long-lost Paula Abdul demo or something that a Prince protege recorded and never released. Very 80s but in a good way!
Kanye West, "Stronger"--Daft Punk samples, shiny visuals, an Isotoner reference, and creative use of blocking swears. Kanye wins AGAIN. 'nuff said.
Rooney--"When Did Your Heart Go Missing?"--HOLY 80S, BATMAN. A Ferris Bueller band name, a video shot on an L.A. beach, and a song that sounds straight from a John Hughes movie. All that's missing is Molly Ringwald.
And this is the freaky bit--
Nickelback, "Rockstar"--Emm and I both agree that everytime we get to the point we can't stand this band, they turn around and come out with something really fun like this.
I think it's the fact that I find pop music is best when it's kept simple and not following a trend (like, say, the rap metal of the late 90s or the recent r&b/rap stuff that refuses to have a normal beat). Okay, so maybe a lot of it is emulating the 70s sound, or at least inspired by it, and maybe that's part of the appeal for us.
*sigh* I think I may have lost my indie cred. :p
emmalyon and I have been watching their morning video shows and the Top 20 Video Countdown almost every Saturday for the past few months, and quite enjoying it. And I haven't enjoyed pop music this much since the mid 80s, and it's kind of freaking me out. It's not as if I don't have access to alternative music anymore (I thank Live 105, KFOG and Alice 97.3 for that), but damn it, I'm a nonconformist! I'm not supposed to like pop music! It goes against my nature! [/snark]Cases in point:
Justin Timberlake, "Lovestoned/I Think She Knows"--damn it, this is funky, and it's full of 80s-style human-beatbox goodness. Probably the same reason I actually had NSYNC's "Pop" on single for awhile.
Nelly Furtado, "Do It"--tell me this isn't a long-lost Paula Abdul demo or something that a Prince protege recorded and never released. Very 80s but in a good way!
Kanye West, "Stronger"--Daft Punk samples, shiny visuals, an Isotoner reference, and creative use of blocking swears. Kanye wins AGAIN. 'nuff said.
Rooney--"When Did Your Heart Go Missing?"--HOLY 80S, BATMAN. A Ferris Bueller band name, a video shot on an L.A. beach, and a song that sounds straight from a John Hughes movie. All that's missing is Molly Ringwald.
And this is the freaky bit--
Nickelback, "Rockstar"--Emm and I both agree that everytime we get to the point we can't stand this band, they turn around and come out with something really fun like this.
I think it's the fact that I find pop music is best when it's kept simple and not following a trend (like, say, the rap metal of the late 90s or the recent r&b/rap stuff that refuses to have a normal beat). Okay, so maybe a lot of it is emulating the 70s sound, or at least inspired by it, and maybe that's part of the appeal for us.
*sigh* I think I may have lost my indie cred. :p
How did I get so old?
Feb. 26th, 2007 02:38 pmSo today, the last day of my vacation, I'm spending it doing laundry and listening to old 80s compilations via recreating them as a playlist on my MusicMatch. I'm also letting random writing ideas float around my head for two future projects: the as-yet-untitled war novel, and the Whiny Gen-X Novel with the current title of The Decline and Fall of Western Massachusetts.
And it suddenly dawns on me, while I'm listening to older music and thinking about rehashing these two ideas I'd had way back in the day, that I'm really having a problem trying to get into the recent spate of indie rock over the last few years. Not only that, but I'm finding myself listening more and more to the older stuff I still go on about...and realizing that I'm doing what back in the day I promised to myself I'd never do: become a mellowed-out nostalgic goofball whining about how crappy today's music is.
Okay, I give up. I admit it. I'm old. I'm 36 and I'm too poor/busy/distracted to follow the indie scene as closely as I used to. Time to put me out to pasture and write my memoirs. :p
And it suddenly dawns on me, while I'm listening to older music and thinking about rehashing these two ideas I'd had way back in the day, that I'm really having a problem trying to get into the recent spate of indie rock over the last few years. Not only that, but I'm finding myself listening more and more to the older stuff I still go on about...and realizing that I'm doing what back in the day I promised to myself I'd never do: become a mellowed-out nostalgic goofball whining about how crappy today's music is.
Okay, I give up. I admit it. I'm old. I'm 36 and I'm too poor/busy/distracted to follow the indie scene as closely as I used to. Time to put me out to pasture and write my memoirs. :p
