SEVEN SONG CIRCLE #1

Something a little different for me. No real rarities in this batch.

Every once in a while, I come up with these little lists of songs that fit together in various ways. Originally I intended to put them on some sort of compilation. Now, since I have this blog, I figured I'd stick a few of these series up here.

I don't know how long this little feature will last, since I only have a finite amount of these at the moment. If you have a suggestions, feel free to pass them along.

In the meantime, enjoy circle #1:

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1 XTC - "That's Really Super, Supergirl"
2 Crash Test Dummies - "Superman's Song"
3 Grant Lee Buffalo - "The Hook"
4 Blues Traveler - "Hook" (live)
5 Bill Lynch - "This is the Theme to Gary's Show"
6 They Might Be Giants - "Boss of Me"
7 They Might Be Giants - "XTC vs Adam Ant"

notes:
1 From the absolutely amazing album, Skylarking. (buy)
2 From their under rated debut album, The Ghosts That Haunt Me. (buy) Continues the "Super-being" theme.
3 From the truly fantastic album, Fuzzy. (buy) Opening line mentions "I don't believe in Superman."
4 Released as a b-side. The studio version is on Four. (buy) The reason for this one is obvious.
5 The theme from It's Gary Shandling's Show. Another song that lyrically de-constructs itself..
6 From the Dial-a-Song compilation. (buy) Also a TV theme song (Malcolm In the Middle).
7 From Severe Tire Damage. (buy) TMBG tune, referencing the first act on the list. An alternate song that could be put here is TMBG's cover of The Dukes of Stratosphere's "25 O'Clock". (The Dukes being an alter-ego of XTC)

If there's ever been an Adam Ant tune that was used as a TV theme song, that would have made a far cleverer #6, but as far as I know, no such animal exists.

That's it for #1. I'll be back on Friday with some actual rare stuff.

MIDNIGHT OIL

I recently saw another blog post the classic Midnight Oil album Red Sails in the Sunset. That reminded me that I have a demo of a vocal version of their song "Bakerman" laying around that I hadn't posted here. While I'm upping that, I may as well put a few more goodies up and make a full post of it.

Now, I'm pretty sure everyone who drops by my blog is already aware of Australia's Midnight Oil. Who among you hasn't heard "Beds Are Burning"?

They officially broke up a few years back, when lead singer Peter Garrett went into politics full time. They have re-formed a couple of times since then, to perform at benefit shows.

Here's some tracks that aren't available on their albums. The sound quality on some of these isn't top notch, as most are from bootlegs.

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Midnight Oil - "Bakerman" (demo with vocals) The one that started me on the way to this post. The very different instrumental version is on Red Sails in the Sunset.
Midnight Oil - "Know Your Product" (live The Saints cover) Covering another legendary Australian band. This is a bootleg recording from a concert in 1990.
Midnight Oil - "Kiss That Girl" A bonus track on some versions of their final album, Capricornia.
Midnight Oil - "Khartoum" (demo) An unreleased song from a Postcard-era demo tape.
Midnight Oil - "The Band Played Waltzing Matilda" (Eric Bogle cover) This is from a WXRT radio session. Though it was written by Eric Bogle, many people know it better through The Pogues version.
Midnight Oil - "Parking Station Blues" (demo) Another unreleased song. This one is from the Red Sails-era demos.
Midnight Oil - "Tell Me the Truth" (acoustic version) From the AlternativeNRG compilation of music recorded with solar power. A mellow version of the rocker from Earth and Sun and Moon.

Buy some of their tunes:

Midnight Oil, 1978
Head Injuries, 1979 (buy)
Bird Noises, 1980 (ep)
Place Without a Postcard, 1981
10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, 1982 (buy import)
Red Sail in the Sunset, 1984 (buy import)
Species Deceases, 1985 (buy) (ep)
Diesel and Dust, 1987 (buy) (buy remaster)
Blue Sky Mining, 1990 (buy)
Scream in Blue, 1992 (buy) (live)
Earth and Sun and Moon, 1993 (buy)
Breathe, 1996
Redneck Wonderland, 1998
The Real Thing, 2000 (buy import) (acoustic live)
Capricornia, 2002 (buy)

Oh, and I still haven't hunted down their studio version of "Peace, Love & Understanding". If anyone out there has a copy. . .?

In local news: The gang from MST3K will be making an appearance at Hoodlum's Music today at 3pm, and performing at the Mesa Arts Center at 8pm today and tomorrow.

PADDY CASEY at SxSW (revisited)

I got a decent response when I uploaded the audio of The Proclaimers' SxSW show a little while back. I figured I'd do the same for the Paddy Casey show from the previous year.

For those who didn't catch it when I uploaded the video a while back - this is from a show Paddy did at the Lone Star Lounge in Austin, Texas. Filmed for a satellite TV broadcast in the early afternoon of March 14, 2008. It's just Paddy and his guitar with Fiona Melady on keyboards.

The audio mix isn't the best I've ever heard. The vocals are a bit "hot" causing some clipping on louder notes, and Fiona's backing vocals are just as loud as Paddy's lead. Particularly noticable in "Fear".

All in all, it's still a good show, and there's so little of Paddy's stuff floating around the net that I wanted to get this out there for his fans.

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Set list:
Sweet Suburban Sky
Refugee (sample)
Whatever Gets You True
Not Out To Get You
You'll Get By
Tonight
Fear
It's Over Now

(Get It Here)

I also included the interview sections that were interspersed throughout the broadcast (though I separated them from the music portion), and put in front and back covers.

Support the artist:

Amen (So Be It), 1999 (buy)
Living, 2004 (buy)
Addicted To Company (Part 1), 2008 (buy)

In other music news: the first four Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds remasters are being released today. Go get 'em.
From Her to Eternity (buy)
The Firstborn is Dead (buy)
Kicking Against the Pricks (buy)
Your Funeral. . . My Trial (buy)

k.d. lang

How's this for an extreme change from the last post. Going from the hard-edged adrenaline pumped American rock of Henry Rollins to the torch-song and twang of Canadian songstress k.d. lang.

Katherine Dawn Lang hails from Alberta, Canada. She began her career in country music there, forming a Patsy Cline tribute band called The Reclines. The Reclines quickly moved away from just being a cover band, and released their debut album, A Truly Western Experience, in 1984.

In the years since then, k.d. has gone solo, become a world-wide headliner, and taken on many different styles of music. Though still often categorized as a country act, these days she's more often singing torch songs, or jazz standards, or dance music.

Here's some of the songs that aren't on her albums:

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k.d. lang - "Golden Slumbers / The End" (Beatles covers) From the soundtrack to the kids' film Happy Feet. (buy)
Madeleine Peyroux with k.d. lang - "River" (Joni Mitchell cover) From Madeleine's album Half the Perfect World. (buy)
k.d. lang - "Miss Chatelaine" (St. Tropez mix) A dancier version than the one on the album (from Ingénue) released as a single.
k.d. lang - "Surrender" The main theme from the James Bond film Tomorrow Never Dies.
Ann Wilson with k.d. lang - "Jackson" (Lieber/Wheeler cover) Ann is the lead singer of Heart. This is from her solo album, Hope & Glory. (buy)
k.d. lang - "So In Love" (Cole Porter cover) From the benefit album Red Hot + Blue (buy), which also has covers by The Pogues, Kirsty MacColl, Sinead O'Connor, Tom Waits. . .
Tony Bennett with k.d. lang - "Keep the Faith, Baby" k.d. recorded one full album with the legendary Tony Bennett, and has made guest appearances on 3 of his other albums. This is from Playing with My Friends. (buy)

Buy some k.d. lang albums:

A Truly Western Experience, 1984 (buy) (with The Reclines)
Angel with a Lariat, 1987 (buy) (with The Reclines)
Shadowland, 1988 (buy)
Absolute Torch and Twang, 1989 (buy)
Ingénue, 1992 (buy)
Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, 1993 (buy) (soundtrack)
All You Can Eat, 1995 (buy)
Drag, 1997 (buy) (covers)
Invincible Summer, 2000 (buy)
A Wonderful World, 2002 (buy) (with Tony Bennett)
Hymns of the 49th Parallel, 2004 (buy) (covers)
Watershed, 2008 (buy)

Maybe someday she'll do a duet with Henry Rollins. That'd be sweet!

HENRY ROLLINS

Henry Rollins is a bit of a Renaissance man. He started out as the lead singer of the legendary punk band Black Flag, but over the years he's evolved into a singer / song writer / actor / spoken word artist / author / activist / television host / radio personality. . .and so on.

If you aren't already familiar with him, don't let the picture fool you. Though he looks like an intense and angry fellow, he's actually a very introspective and intelligent individual. Though, he is pretty intense sometimes.

Since the eighties, Rollins has been releasing albums as a solo artist, with Black Flag, and with Rollins Band. So, there's quite a bit out there for you to get a hold of if you're a fan. Some of the things that might slip through the cracks, though, are the many collaborations he's done.

Here's some of those:

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Mike Watt with Henry Rollins - "Sexual Military Dynamics" Watt was the bass player in The Minutemen and firehose, and later The Stooges. His first "solo" album had guest appearances from just about every alternative band ever. This is from that album, Ball Hog or Tugboat.
Henry Rollins - "Purple Heart" (Charles Mingus cover) This is from the tribute album Weird Nightmare: Meditations on Mingus.(buy) The album features interpretations of Mingus' music, and sometimes pieces of unpublished portions of his autobiography, Beneath the Underdog (buy), read over the music. Here, Rollins reads "Groovy" over the Mingus composition "Purple Heart".

Henry Rollins & Goldie - "T-4 Strain" From the Spawn soundtrack.(buy)
William Shatner with Henry Rollins - "I Can't Get Behind That" Shatner is God. That's all you need to know. This is from His album Has Been. (buy)
Les Claypool and the Holy Mackerel with Henry Rollins - "Delicate Tendrils" From Les's album Highball with the Devil. (buy)
Henry Rollins and the Hard-Ons - "Let There Be Rock" (AC/DC cover) A one-off single collaboration.
Tony Iommi with Henry Rollins - "Laughing Man (In the Devil Mask)" From a self-titled solo album from the Black Sabbath guitarist.

And a bonus non-Rollins cut:
Chuck D - "Gunslinging Bird (or If Charlie Parker Were a Gunslinger, There'd Be a Whole Lot of Dead Copycats)" (Charles Mingus cover) Another track from Weird Nightmare. This one features Chuck reading "Fire at the Coconut Grove". I highly recommend this album.

Henry Rollins post-Black Flag music-only discography (unless otherwise noted, released as Rollins Band):

Hot Animal Machine, 1987 (as Henry Rollins)
Drive By Shooting, 1987 (ep) (as Henrietta Collins and the Wifebeating Childhaters)
Life Time, 1987 (buy)
Hard Volume, 1989
The End of Silence, 1992 (buy)
Weight, 1994 (buy)
Come In and Burn, 1997 (buy)
Get Some Go Again, 2000 (buy) (Henry Rollins and Mother Superior)
Nice, 2001 (buy)

Get all of his books, dvds, other cds, etc. here.

WAKE THE PRESIDENT

Something a little different for my blog. Usually, I stick to just the rarer songs by various bands I like. This time I'm going to try to hype an album that I've become addicted to as of late.

Wake The President are a Scottish band whose debut album, You Can't Change That Boy, was recently released overseas, and is due to be released in The States in a couple weeks.

They play a sort-of jangle pop with a thick (by my standards, anyway) Scottish accent. Sort of like The Proclaimers, with more edge and less harmonizing. Though, that doesn't really do them justice. A bit like Frightened Rabbit is probably a closer match.

As I mentioned a while back, I recently lost my job. Naturally, given that situation, my mood has at times not been the cheeriest. This album has managed to brighten me up several times while driving around, checking out leads.

It's been a while since a new album did that for me - the first albums by The Fratellis and Arctic Monkeys both held that honor back when they were issued.

So, anyway, try a couple of songs out for yourself. If you like them, buy the album. It's out either May 19th or 26th (Amazon says one thing, the band's myspace says the other).

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Two tracks from You Can't Change That Boy (buy):
Wake The President - "Professor"
Wake The President - "Mail, Alice"

Two rarer songs (in low quality) from streaming audio on their home page:
Wake The President - "I'm Sorry"
Wake The President - "Sorrow for Clothes"

Now, hopefully, they'll tour over here sometime soon.

THIS PICTURE

I had initially set this post up for about a month ago. Right about then, the b-sides for "Breath Deeply Now" started showing up at a couple of other blogs. I didn't want to look like I was jumping on the band wagon, so I pushed it back until now. Let me know if any links have expired in the interim.

British band This Picture formed in the late eighties, and stuck around until the mid-nineties, releasing two albums while they were together. They never really made a big splash, likely because their style was sort of Joshua Tree-era U2, while radio had already moved on to heavier grunge stuff.

They did have their share of fans, though. I was rather fond of the single “Naked Rain”, but then I’ve always been a sucker for rock songs with fiddles.

Here’s some of the b-sides off 3 of their singles. All of these are from 1991, the year of their first album.

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This Picture - “Naked Rain” I figured I’d put up the a-side to this one, since it was the closest thing they had to a hit.
This Picture - “With You I Can Never Win” B-side of “Naked Rain”, also later issued as an a-side between albums.
This Picture - “Blacker Than” B-side of “Stronger Than Life Itself”
This Picture - “Not Whole, Not Half, Not Man” B-side of “Stronger Than Life Itself”
This Picture - “When Your Eyes Are Closed” B-side of “Stronger Than Life Itself”
This Picture - “The Offering” B-side of “Breathe Deeply Now”
This Picture - “Death’s Sweet Religion” (Acoustic Version) B-side of “Breathe Deeply Now”, original version on A Violent Impression.
This Picture - “I Can’t Help Myself” B-side of “Breathe Deeply Now”


This Picture discography:

A Violent Impression, 1991
City of Sin, 1994

Both albums are out of print, but can be found in many used cd shops.

If any of you happen to be in The Valley this weekend, make some time to stop by the Hoodstock benefit at Hoodlums Music in Tempe. It's for a great cause, and it's at a great store. More info here: