When you work four days of ten hours, you tend to forget how time
flies. We're already halfway through the month. We're hoping to do
Madison the end of month before the Final Arizona Trip in August and
while we have plane fare to get there, I still am not sure if I want to
subject myself to the humilation of going through security at the
airports anymore.
Cedar Rapids one month later going through the old neighborhood, it's
simply too dark to go driving through Czech Village. And still can't
believe how dark it gets. Most of the Czech Village stores have their
doors open and with the sounds of running fans. Nothing like seeing the
old train bridge from Penick Ford, in the river, watching the moonlight
shine off it. And this river was 31 feet a month ago, now back into
its banks.
And at work while i don't see a single earwig, I come home and have
four of them fucking things scurrying about in the basement. Like
everything else, harmless but annoying this time of year.
The songs of the week as follows.
1. You Got The Look I Like-Nick Lowe 1990 This was the last good
Lowe album and the last that had anything to do with Dave Edmunds who
produced it. He's no longer the pop master of the Rockpile years but
rather does a lot more mellower and spare stuff. Didn't care much for
his last couple albums but this song did get some radio airplay from
KFMH 99 plus back when we had decent radio stations and not Clear
Channel Clones or Cummulus Clones. They all sound the same. I miss the
Rockpile years too.
2. Nobody Said It Was Easy-LeRoux 1982 Formerly Louisana LeRoux who
made a bunch of albums for Capitol before moving on to RCA and making a
good album which never came out on CD called Last Safe Place. This was
their biggest hit to which even I don't think this song is on any
compliation. Certainly nothing on Time Life Music. Another forgotten
hit single from a band nobody knows about anymore.
3. Media Man-Flash And The Pan 1980 Song from the second album from
the Vanda/Young team that was once part of The Easybeats and produced
the best of the AC DC albums of the late 70s. Inspriation final line to
song. Popularity, Ratings! Bullshit. So much for hit single
potential on that guys.
4. Good Grief-Foo Fighters 1995 Nothing against Dave Grohl's band
but he's never topped anything since his first album which was actually
Dave playing everything and adding drums to them. Or was it the other
way around? Last time I visited Erin at Alter Ego she was playing this
album and I meant to mention it on a Top Ten but kept forgetting till
now. The Foos have done quite well in making albums since then but I
quit buying after One By One. They're really not that bad, just nothing
I can't remember and nothing I'd rather listen to. Heck I don't play
One By One anymore. When I wanna hear some Foos, I'll pull out number
one.
5. Comin Down-Switches 2008 This is a British band that owes a lot
to Blur, Glam rock and Franz Ferdinand and given the high background
singers, The Darkness although not as bombastic and more pop. This is
better than The Darkness, it does come close to Franz Ferdinand. But
you won't hear this on the radio. In other words another tax write off
for Doug Morris and Universal.
6. The Hand That Feeds-Aerosmith 1977 Draw The Line had a tough act
to follow. In fact, Aerosmith had a three pong attack of A albums such
as Get Your Wings, Toys In The Attic and Rocks, plus the guys were so
wacked out on drugs and booze they couldn't remember much of this
album. It's ragged as hell and when I first played it and reviewed it, I
didn't care much for it but that B minus grade turned out to be a B
plus and most of this album is listenable. Which is more than I can say
for the next offerings, 1978's Live Bootleg and 1979's Night In The
Ruts. Actually Draw The Line pretty much beats out most of the Geffen
albums that fueled their comeback. No prissy ballads here, just sex,
drugs and more drugs and rock and roll.
7. Long Way To The Top-Nantucket 1980 Cover of the AC DC original
done after the passing of Bon Scott. Nantucket was a average bar band
on the east coast that made three albums for Epic including namesake
title but priced at 5.98 to promote the band and it did become their
biggest selling album to date but not enough to keep them going. Epic
dropped them and Nantucket made a forgettible finale for RCA in 1982.
However, they must be remembered, Wounded Bird issued their Epic albums
on CD.
8. Spice Of Life-Lizzy Williams 2005 To me Lizzy still remains that
one of a kind artist. An artist with a heart of gold and good singing
voice and unlike most of these My Space artists and bands out there,
keeps in touch with her fans. And sometimes takes time out to read a
blog or two. As a music fan I love that. An artist that who is
dedicated to her fans as vice versa. I think Lizzy has more staying
power than, say Lily Allen or Pink, she's a lot more honest than they
are.
9. Drop It (An Old Disguise)-REO Speedwagon 1979 A shout out to REO
for helping out during the floods and getting the key to the city of
Des Moines in the process. REO remains one of the good guys of rock and
roll and care about the fans as well as the fans care about REO. I
haven't bought anything from them since 1982's underperformed Good
Trouble, the ballads just turned me away but for their good deed maybe
I'll check out their latest album. Soundstage recorded them on a very
good night and that was shown on PBS last weekend. Sure they're a
tribute band now but since getting rid of Gary Ricrath, at least the
egos have been trimmed down a bit.
10. Let's See Action-The Who 1972 To me, the only band that
mattered before Rockpile was The Who, why because they had Keith Moon,
the drummer that made me want to play drums and during this period they
were better than The Stones and better than Zeppelin which is saying a
lot. Although classic rock radio still overplays Who's Next, I still
find myself cranking up Won't Get Fooled Again from time to time. It's a
song i haven't gotten sick of (yet). I'm sure Pete had his reasons to
keep Who's Next down to a single album, but had he gone on to include
the songs that made up Lifehouse, I can see that Who's Next would have
been the greatest two album set ever. Since that didn't happen, it was
Physical Graffati. Or perhaps Live At Leeds had that been a two record
set. Too bad Keith and John are not around. I miss them a lot.
Good riddence Jesse Helms
Consertive bigshot expired on Independence Day at age 86. Partly reponsible for the woes of the country we now in.
RIP
Dustin Eglseder, super big Cub fan who won the the chance to
sing take me out to the ball game last September 21, 2007 against the
Pirates, succumbed to cancer Wednesday this week. He will be missed.
Diggy Kat's Last word:
OMG!!! "Good Grief"!!! you know there is something amazing about that
song! i have loved that song since i first heard it back in 1995. and it still brings me right back to 1995!
you're right! their debut was terrific! i personally thought their 2nd
cd "Colour And The Shape" was just as top notch! and then they released
"Nothing Left To Lose" =| ok, mind you i haven't actually given this
album a spin in quite a long time but that's because i heard the single
"Learn To Fly" and fell in love with the song, i still adore it and i
got the cd from the library and save for that song and "Gimme Stitches"
there was
