Avett Brothers
I’ve already written a couple of trees worth of words about this band in this year’s RT 20. But here’s a few more. I was reading up on the band recently and I saw a very apt description of their sound—Americana with attitude. The way they mix folk, country, hillbilly, and blues, and view it through the prism of rock and a touch of punk is something that I’m still amazed never crossed my radar before. This trio seems tailor made for the way my musical tastes have grown over the past decade. Any band that can write a song called “The Ballad of Love and Hate,” whose opening line, “Love writes a letter and sends it to Hate,” is one that will have me as a fan for life. As my dear friend Jodie emailed me after I sent her some Avetts music, “I didn't know I could enjoy the banjo so much.”
The Move
One night at my favorite tapas bar Sample (okay, the only tapas bar I ever go to) this song came on and had me hooked within 30 seconds. I thought it was the Faces, but quickly realized it wasn’t Rod Stewart singing. Then I thought it could have been the James Gang, but that wasn’t Joe Walsh either. I thought, “Who the hell is this? And how many distinct parts does this song have?” So I grabbed my trusty iPhone and opened up the Shazam app, which using…well, I really don’t know what it uses, black magic perhaps. That’s not important. Well, I suppose it is if the Shazam app unloads some voodoo curse on me. Anyhoo, Shazam can identify songs if you hold up the iPhone’s mouthpiece near the speaker. After doing its magic (well, you get what I’m saying) it told me that it was The Move’s “Feel Too Good.” Now I had heard of the Move because I knew Cheap Trick cited them as huge influences (and did a great cover of Move founder Roy Wood’s “California Man”) and that Jeff Lynne was in the band before starting Electric Light Orchestra. I had no idea that the band created such over the top rock songs. “Feel Too Good” went on for nine and a half minutes, and by the time it was over I wanted it to go for another 10. The Monday after I heard it I asked my friend (and head of the department I reside in at work) Ira Robbins if he could bring in some Move albums. Within a few days I had listened to virtually everything the band released in their brief six year existence. And holy shit, they did everything in that time. The breath of range in their catalog is incredible. And I kept mentally slapping myself in the head for not investigating this band further the very first time someone told me “Do Ya” was not first done by ELO. Duh.
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
2009's Top 10 Visual Aids
10) 30 for 30 (ESPN)
HBO has had a stranglehold on the title of best sports documentary producers for at least a decade now. They're always well written. The wide cross range of people they speak to (athletes, sportswriters, fans) usually have interesting things to say about the chosen topic. And each doc has the dulcet tones of Liev Schreiber as your not-voice-of-god-but-kinda-close narrator. It’s a winning formula, and whenever a new one debuts I make sure to record it. This year THE sports network woke up and decided, “Hey, we can do just as good a job as them—and much better than our SportsCentury series.” So ESPN ran with the suggestion of doing 30 films to mark the network's 30th anniversary from an employee who knows about connecting with sports fans—“The Sports Guy,” Bill Simmons. His idea of 30 different directors picking topics that haven't been told to death was inspired. What are the chances we'd get an entire hour on Jimmy the Greek without Simmons’ brainstorm? (I’d lay odds on it in tribute to the NFL Today linesmaker, but I lay off gambling when I'm writing the list each year.) 30 for 30 grabbed some excellent directors (Barry Levinson, Peter Berg) who tackled fascinating topics (the Baltimore Colts marching band after the team left town, Wayne Gretzky being traded to Los Angeles) and spun them into some great work. Two of the 30 for 30 films, Without Bias and Muhammad and Larry, are almost painful to watch. In one you see someone’s potential snuffed out in one fateful night and in the other you witness the downfall of a great champion who should have not been in a ring in 1980. (Watching Ali train in that film compared to six years earlier in When We Were Kings is especially troubling when you see how his speech and movement had slowed down during that time. No wonder his fight doctor, Ferdie Pacheco, quit Ali's corner in disgust in 1977.) 30 for 30 continues in 2010 and is a must see series for any sports fan.
9) Ace of Cakes (Food Network)
This year I found myself going off the beaten path cable network-wise. It was my desperate attempt to be entertained on weekend afternoons in that annoying time after football playoffs end and before spring training games. One Sunday afternoon I stumbled upon the Food Network and a show called Ace of Cakes. What I saw was this huge cake that looked like it must not be a cake. (I can’t recall exactly what it was, but it had to be about four feet tall.) I was memorized by this tasty treat in front of me and I watched the rest of the episode. I started watching the Sunday shows even when baseball season began. And when the new season debuted in July, I was totally hooked. I can even ignore the fact that “reality” show about Charm City Cakes in Baltimore has a writer listed in the credits each week. What makes this “reality” show better than most is that the people at Charm City cakes don’t look like they’re from central casting. The head chef, Duff Goldman, is a big dude with a shaved head and an infectious laugh. The sous chef Geof is a soft spoken guy with a knack for creating exact representations of famous buildings—and perhaps the driest wit of any person on TV not working for The Daily Show or The Colbert Report. Obviously all the bad and mundane things that happen at the bakery are left on the cutting room floor. And yet the final product doesn’t seem too manufactured. These people look like they actually enjoy working with each other and being in front of cameras all the time hasn’t transformed them all that much. Oh, and it’s a SHOW ABOUT CAKE! How could I not love it?
8) Robyn Hitchcock: I Often Dream of Trains in New York (Sundance/Yeproc)
In the fall of 2008 Robyn Hitchcock did a tour performing his 1984 album I Often Dream of Trains in its entirety. For some stupid reason I cannot recall, I passed on going to this show when it played at Symphony Space in Manhattan. After I saw this documentary on the Sundance Channel this summer, I literally slapped my forehead in disgust for being so stupid. It’s hard to believe that almost 25 years after its release, Hitchcock sounds better singing these songs now than he did on the original recording. All the performances are stellar and he even throws in a great new song (“Up to Our Nex”) at the end. What moves I Often Dream of Trains in New York above the standard concert film are the interview segments with Hitchcock. He talks—in a way only he can—about the songs, their meanings and a bunch of other topics that are fascinating and head scratching at the same time. And he does it all on an Amtrak train from Washington, D.C. to New York. It’s the best press Amtrak has gotten since…well, it’s the only good press Amtrak has ever gotten. Of course, if the director John Edginton wanted to capture a true Amtrak trip, he would have gotten Hitchcock on a morning train from Chicago to New York that’s probably running 3 hours late as I write this. Fucking Amtrak.
7) The Lost Son of Havana (ESPN)
After making the film festival rounds for six months, ESPN picked up this documentary to air after a Boston Red Sox and Detroit Tigers Monday night game. Being that it was an American League game, it was no surprise it stretched to almost four hours and pushed the start time of the film back to almost 11. It’s a shame that The Lost Son of Havana wasn’t aired in primetime on the East Coast because a story this compelling deserved a wider audience. The film focuses on Red Sox legend Luis Tiant, who left his native Cuba for pro baseball in 1961 and hadn't been back in 46 years. In 2007, after diplomatic finagling through back channels, Tiant and director Jonathan Hock got to fly into Cuba under the guise of a baseball team looking to play some exhibitions. (Hock and his crew posed as part of a ball team and played against Cubans during the trip.) Tiant’s return is a bittersweet affair, as the reunions with his surviving relatives are emotion-filled moments where they’re happy to see him and talk glowingly about his accomplishments and at the same time upset that he never returned sooner. The Lost Son of Havana is a look at Cuba most of us have never seen before and is well worth seeking out on Netflix even if you’re not a baseball fan.
6) Community (NBC)
The best new show of the 2009-2010 season (sorry Glee fans) is—shockingly—on NBC, the network that’s acting like it doesn’t want to be a network. I was hooked on this comedy set at the fictional Greendale Community College from a moment in the pilot when sleazy and smooth-talking lawyer Jeff Winger (Joel McHale) talks about how he got professor a DUI acquittal by connecting it to 9/11. “You did seem less into integrity the day that I convinced 12 of your peers that the day you made a U-turn on the freeway and tried to order chalupas from the emergency call box, that your only real crime was loving America.” The professor (played by Daily Show correspondent John Oliver) insists, “Well, I do love America. I love it very much. I love chalupas.” And from that hilarious start, Community has only gotten better with each episode. And this is a show that co-stars Chevy Chase. And he’s good. Seriously. The writing staff has played off of Chase’s rep as a prick by making that an essential part of his character Pierce, who boasts of having invented an “award-winning moist towelette.” And they’ve also worked in his talent for pratfalls and made them funny. It’s a transformation to behold. Danny Pudi is the biggest discovery in the rest of the mostly unknown cast, as his Abed has no internal censor and says whatever comes into his mind. Abed also has the biggest pop culture knowledge of any character on TV, which allows the writers to come up a multitude of gags that recall everything from The Breakfast Club to An American Tail. (Seeing two of the characters singing “Somewhere Out There” to find the mouse from their lab experiment is the funniest thing I’ve seen on TV this year. Well, it’s almost as funny as Kanye bum-rushing Taylor Swift.) Discovering Community makes me glad the band doesn’t have gigs on Thursday nights any more.
5) Lost (ABC)
With just one more season to go (oh, I can’t wait for February 2nd) Lost’s fifth season continued the creative rebirth that started at the end of season three. The whole time travel aspect was a bit mind-fogging at times, yet it gave us a compelling pairing of characters with Sawyer and Juliet shacking up to play house in the 1970s. The on-screen chemistry between Josh Holloway and Elizabeth Mitchell was tremendous and makes me wish that (spoiler alert) that Juliet didn’t die when the a-bomb went off in the season finale. I’m going to miss my favorite show of the oughts when it ends in May. I guess I’ll have to pick up the DVDs then and relive it over the summer.
4) Taking Chance (HBO)
Taking Chance is a tearjerker, no doubt about it. I’m not one to usually watch this type of film, but Kevin Bacon’s performance (and the simple and spare way the story is told) made it hard to turn it off. Bacon plays Lt. Col. Michael Strobl, a Marine veteran whose journal served as the basis for the script. Strobl served in the first Gulf War but had worked a desk job throughout the current war in Iraq. Feeling guilty over being at home while so many servicemen were risking their lives, he volunteered to escort the body of Lance Corporal Chance Phelps to his final resting place. The film covers every part of that journey, from Dover Air Force base to Wyoming, with stops in Philadelphia and Minneapolis along the way. Taking Chance is filled with details of this trip (like a shook up flight attendant who thrusts a gold crucifix into the hands of Strobl or former Air Force pilot announcing to the passengers on his Northwest flight about the honorable soldier they’ve been carrying) but really Chance and Strobl are just representatives of the thousands of service members we've lost and the men and women who carry them home. The point that every lost service member is treated with this kind of respect is shown during an extended sequence at the Dover mortuary. It shows the attention to detail that goes cleaning, restoring and dressing each body, and then the salutes given to each departing hearse, not just by the service members but by any civilians who happen to be there that day. And if the scene where everyone at the Minneapolis airport stops and salutes the coffin doesn’t grab the heartstrings, then you’re probably Dick Cheney. Perhaps best of all, Taking Chance has no political agenda. No one in the film is for or against the war. But in presenting what happens when our soldiers and Marines killed over there come home, it serves as a powerful reminder that their lives indeed mattered.
3) Flight of the Conchords (HBO)
I usually feel kind of ticked off when a show I love ends seemingly before its time. But I’m not angry about the early December announcement that Flight of the Conchords would not go into a third season. At the end of their second season the duo was deported back to a New Zealand sheep ranch, and manager Murray was either deported as well—or he simply joined them because he has to keep managing the band. It’s a fitting (and very funny way) to close out a show that upped the quality of its writing its second year. Brett McKenzie and Jermaine Clement seemed to have a better grasp on what they wanted out of the show comedy-wise; the secondary characters were more sharply drawn and were much funnier; and even when the songs weren't that memorable, the quality of the videos was significantly higher. (The Michel Gondry video for “Carol Brown” is by far the best they ever did.) On the other hand, the songs were the weakest part of this season. (Which makes sense, as the duo admitted that they’ve plowed through their back catalog for the show.) I could see how coming up with new songs and new scripts at the same time could be too much to bear. I'd love to watch it a couple more seasons, but I don’t want the quality to drop off a cliff. There’s something to be said for knowing to quit while you’re ahead.
2) Burn Notice (USA)
Burn Notice is one of those rare shows that has, with all apologies to Bill Simmons and his Book of Basketball that’s taken me forever to get through because of the 7,809 footnotes, made “the leap.” It started as a summer diversion, moved into the steady viewing realm with the first half of its second season, and then became essential with its’ stunning second season finale and the almost as good third season summer finale. The choices Michael Weston (the amazing Jeffery Donavan) has made in trying to recover his spy career have felt, well, for lack of a better term, epic. The killing of the show’s villains from the past two seasons (Carla the “handler” from season two, Michael’s sleazy intelligence contact Strickler in the summer finale) have raised the stakes for all the characters in a way I couldn’t have imagined watching the first season in 2007. And again, any show with Bruce Campbell and his chin will always be worth watching.
1) Chuck (NBC)
As with Burn Notice, Chuck made “the leap” in its second season as well. Perhaps it’s the fact that both shows dove deeper into their mythology (Burn Notice with the far reaching plot of Michael being burned, Chuck with who created the intersect in Chuck’s head) that made them seem more essential. There are programs on TV that are more complex, have much tighter plots, and are better as strict comedies, but none of them are this much fun. Any season finale that features a climactic shootout set to two characters covering Styx’s “Mr. Roboto”…at a wedding…well, that will be saved on my DVR until the damn thing melts down on top of my TV. If Chuck was just a slapdash collection of in-jokes and ’80s references, then it would be Family Guy. (Without the talking dog.) But what makes Chuck special—and inspired thousands of fans to go to Subway on one day in May it hopes of spurring its renewal—is that beneath all the references there is a warmth and humanity. You can tell that this group of fine actors have the utmost love and respect for their characters, which makes the jokes that much more satisfying, the action cooler, and the Tron and Rush references more enjoyable. So let me wrap up the Visual Aids list by making a plea for you to watch it when it has its season premiere January 10th. It’s not too late to jump in on the best show on NBC.
HBO has had a stranglehold on the title of best sports documentary producers for at least a decade now. They're always well written. The wide cross range of people they speak to (athletes, sportswriters, fans) usually have interesting things to say about the chosen topic. And each doc has the dulcet tones of Liev Schreiber as your not-voice-of-god-but-kinda-close narrator. It’s a winning formula, and whenever a new one debuts I make sure to record it. This year THE sports network woke up and decided, “Hey, we can do just as good a job as them—and much better than our SportsCentury series.” So ESPN ran with the suggestion of doing 30 films to mark the network's 30th anniversary from an employee who knows about connecting with sports fans—“The Sports Guy,” Bill Simmons. His idea of 30 different directors picking topics that haven't been told to death was inspired. What are the chances we'd get an entire hour on Jimmy the Greek without Simmons’ brainstorm? (I’d lay odds on it in tribute to the NFL Today linesmaker, but I lay off gambling when I'm writing the list each year.) 30 for 30 grabbed some excellent directors (Barry Levinson, Peter Berg) who tackled fascinating topics (the Baltimore Colts marching band after the team left town, Wayne Gretzky being traded to Los Angeles) and spun them into some great work. Two of the 30 for 30 films, Without Bias and Muhammad and Larry, are almost painful to watch. In one you see someone’s potential snuffed out in one fateful night and in the other you witness the downfall of a great champion who should have not been in a ring in 1980. (Watching Ali train in that film compared to six years earlier in When We Were Kings is especially troubling when you see how his speech and movement had slowed down during that time. No wonder his fight doctor, Ferdie Pacheco, quit Ali's corner in disgust in 1977.) 30 for 30 continues in 2010 and is a must see series for any sports fan.
9) Ace of Cakes (Food Network)
This year I found myself going off the beaten path cable network-wise. It was my desperate attempt to be entertained on weekend afternoons in that annoying time after football playoffs end and before spring training games. One Sunday afternoon I stumbled upon the Food Network and a show called Ace of Cakes. What I saw was this huge cake that looked like it must not be a cake. (I can’t recall exactly what it was, but it had to be about four feet tall.) I was memorized by this tasty treat in front of me and I watched the rest of the episode. I started watching the Sunday shows even when baseball season began. And when the new season debuted in July, I was totally hooked. I can even ignore the fact that “reality” show about Charm City Cakes in Baltimore has a writer listed in the credits each week. What makes this “reality” show better than most is that the people at Charm City cakes don’t look like they’re from central casting. The head chef, Duff Goldman, is a big dude with a shaved head and an infectious laugh. The sous chef Geof is a soft spoken guy with a knack for creating exact representations of famous buildings—and perhaps the driest wit of any person on TV not working for The Daily Show or The Colbert Report. Obviously all the bad and mundane things that happen at the bakery are left on the cutting room floor. And yet the final product doesn’t seem too manufactured. These people look like they actually enjoy working with each other and being in front of cameras all the time hasn’t transformed them all that much. Oh, and it’s a SHOW ABOUT CAKE! How could I not love it?
8) Robyn Hitchcock: I Often Dream of Trains in New York (Sundance/Yeproc)
In the fall of 2008 Robyn Hitchcock did a tour performing his 1984 album I Often Dream of Trains in its entirety. For some stupid reason I cannot recall, I passed on going to this show when it played at Symphony Space in Manhattan. After I saw this documentary on the Sundance Channel this summer, I literally slapped my forehead in disgust for being so stupid. It’s hard to believe that almost 25 years after its release, Hitchcock sounds better singing these songs now than he did on the original recording. All the performances are stellar and he even throws in a great new song (“Up to Our Nex”) at the end. What moves I Often Dream of Trains in New York above the standard concert film are the interview segments with Hitchcock. He talks—in a way only he can—about the songs, their meanings and a bunch of other topics that are fascinating and head scratching at the same time. And he does it all on an Amtrak train from Washington, D.C. to New York. It’s the best press Amtrak has gotten since…well, it’s the only good press Amtrak has ever gotten. Of course, if the director John Edginton wanted to capture a true Amtrak trip, he would have gotten Hitchcock on a morning train from Chicago to New York that’s probably running 3 hours late as I write this. Fucking Amtrak.
7) The Lost Son of Havana (ESPN)
After making the film festival rounds for six months, ESPN picked up this documentary to air after a Boston Red Sox and Detroit Tigers Monday night game. Being that it was an American League game, it was no surprise it stretched to almost four hours and pushed the start time of the film back to almost 11. It’s a shame that The Lost Son of Havana wasn’t aired in primetime on the East Coast because a story this compelling deserved a wider audience. The film focuses on Red Sox legend Luis Tiant, who left his native Cuba for pro baseball in 1961 and hadn't been back in 46 years. In 2007, after diplomatic finagling through back channels, Tiant and director Jonathan Hock got to fly into Cuba under the guise of a baseball team looking to play some exhibitions. (Hock and his crew posed as part of a ball team and played against Cubans during the trip.) Tiant’s return is a bittersweet affair, as the reunions with his surviving relatives are emotion-filled moments where they’re happy to see him and talk glowingly about his accomplishments and at the same time upset that he never returned sooner. The Lost Son of Havana is a look at Cuba most of us have never seen before and is well worth seeking out on Netflix even if you’re not a baseball fan.
6) Community (NBC)
The best new show of the 2009-2010 season (sorry Glee fans) is—shockingly—on NBC, the network that’s acting like it doesn’t want to be a network. I was hooked on this comedy set at the fictional Greendale Community College from a moment in the pilot when sleazy and smooth-talking lawyer Jeff Winger (Joel McHale) talks about how he got professor a DUI acquittal by connecting it to 9/11. “You did seem less into integrity the day that I convinced 12 of your peers that the day you made a U-turn on the freeway and tried to order chalupas from the emergency call box, that your only real crime was loving America.” The professor (played by Daily Show correspondent John Oliver) insists, “Well, I do love America. I love it very much. I love chalupas.” And from that hilarious start, Community has only gotten better with each episode. And this is a show that co-stars Chevy Chase. And he’s good. Seriously. The writing staff has played off of Chase’s rep as a prick by making that an essential part of his character Pierce, who boasts of having invented an “award-winning moist towelette.” And they’ve also worked in his talent for pratfalls and made them funny. It’s a transformation to behold. Danny Pudi is the biggest discovery in the rest of the mostly unknown cast, as his Abed has no internal censor and says whatever comes into his mind. Abed also has the biggest pop culture knowledge of any character on TV, which allows the writers to come up a multitude of gags that recall everything from The Breakfast Club to An American Tail. (Seeing two of the characters singing “Somewhere Out There” to find the mouse from their lab experiment is the funniest thing I’ve seen on TV this year. Well, it’s almost as funny as Kanye bum-rushing Taylor Swift.) Discovering Community makes me glad the band doesn’t have gigs on Thursday nights any more.
5) Lost (ABC)
With just one more season to go (oh, I can’t wait for February 2nd) Lost’s fifth season continued the creative rebirth that started at the end of season three. The whole time travel aspect was a bit mind-fogging at times, yet it gave us a compelling pairing of characters with Sawyer and Juliet shacking up to play house in the 1970s. The on-screen chemistry between Josh Holloway and Elizabeth Mitchell was tremendous and makes me wish that (spoiler alert) that Juliet didn’t die when the a-bomb went off in the season finale. I’m going to miss my favorite show of the oughts when it ends in May. I guess I’ll have to pick up the DVDs then and relive it over the summer.
4) Taking Chance (HBO)
Taking Chance is a tearjerker, no doubt about it. I’m not one to usually watch this type of film, but Kevin Bacon’s performance (and the simple and spare way the story is told) made it hard to turn it off. Bacon plays Lt. Col. Michael Strobl, a Marine veteran whose journal served as the basis for the script. Strobl served in the first Gulf War but had worked a desk job throughout the current war in Iraq. Feeling guilty over being at home while so many servicemen were risking their lives, he volunteered to escort the body of Lance Corporal Chance Phelps to his final resting place. The film covers every part of that journey, from Dover Air Force base to Wyoming, with stops in Philadelphia and Minneapolis along the way. Taking Chance is filled with details of this trip (like a shook up flight attendant who thrusts a gold crucifix into the hands of Strobl or former Air Force pilot announcing to the passengers on his Northwest flight about the honorable soldier they’ve been carrying) but really Chance and Strobl are just representatives of the thousands of service members we've lost and the men and women who carry them home. The point that every lost service member is treated with this kind of respect is shown during an extended sequence at the Dover mortuary. It shows the attention to detail that goes cleaning, restoring and dressing each body, and then the salutes given to each departing hearse, not just by the service members but by any civilians who happen to be there that day. And if the scene where everyone at the Minneapolis airport stops and salutes the coffin doesn’t grab the heartstrings, then you’re probably Dick Cheney. Perhaps best of all, Taking Chance has no political agenda. No one in the film is for or against the war. But in presenting what happens when our soldiers and Marines killed over there come home, it serves as a powerful reminder that their lives indeed mattered.
3) Flight of the Conchords (HBO)
I usually feel kind of ticked off when a show I love ends seemingly before its time. But I’m not angry about the early December announcement that Flight of the Conchords would not go into a third season. At the end of their second season the duo was deported back to a New Zealand sheep ranch, and manager Murray was either deported as well—or he simply joined them because he has to keep managing the band. It’s a fitting (and very funny way) to close out a show that upped the quality of its writing its second year. Brett McKenzie and Jermaine Clement seemed to have a better grasp on what they wanted out of the show comedy-wise; the secondary characters were more sharply drawn and were much funnier; and even when the songs weren't that memorable, the quality of the videos was significantly higher. (The Michel Gondry video for “Carol Brown” is by far the best they ever did.) On the other hand, the songs were the weakest part of this season. (Which makes sense, as the duo admitted that they’ve plowed through their back catalog for the show.) I could see how coming up with new songs and new scripts at the same time could be too much to bear. I'd love to watch it a couple more seasons, but I don’t want the quality to drop off a cliff. There’s something to be said for knowing to quit while you’re ahead.
2) Burn Notice (USA)
Burn Notice is one of those rare shows that has, with all apologies to Bill Simmons and his Book of Basketball that’s taken me forever to get through because of the 7,809 footnotes, made “the leap.” It started as a summer diversion, moved into the steady viewing realm with the first half of its second season, and then became essential with its’ stunning second season finale and the almost as good third season summer finale. The choices Michael Weston (the amazing Jeffery Donavan) has made in trying to recover his spy career have felt, well, for lack of a better term, epic. The killing of the show’s villains from the past two seasons (Carla the “handler” from season two, Michael’s sleazy intelligence contact Strickler in the summer finale) have raised the stakes for all the characters in a way I couldn’t have imagined watching the first season in 2007. And again, any show with Bruce Campbell and his chin will always be worth watching.
1) Chuck (NBC)
As with Burn Notice, Chuck made “the leap” in its second season as well. Perhaps it’s the fact that both shows dove deeper into their mythology (Burn Notice with the far reaching plot of Michael being burned, Chuck with who created the intersect in Chuck’s head) that made them seem more essential. There are programs on TV that are more complex, have much tighter plots, and are better as strict comedies, but none of them are this much fun. Any season finale that features a climactic shootout set to two characters covering Styx’s “Mr. Roboto”…at a wedding…well, that will be saved on my DVR until the damn thing melts down on top of my TV. If Chuck was just a slapdash collection of in-jokes and ’80s references, then it would be Family Guy. (Without the talking dog.) But what makes Chuck special—and inspired thousands of fans to go to Subway on one day in May it hopes of spurring its renewal—is that beneath all the references there is a warmth and humanity. You can tell that this group of fine actors have the utmost love and respect for their characters, which makes the jokes that much more satisfying, the action cooler, and the Tron and Rush references more enjoyable. So let me wrap up the Visual Aids list by making a plea for you to watch it when it has its season premiere January 10th. It’s not too late to jump in on the best show on NBC.
20 for 20: Albums That Changed My Life Over the Past Two Decades
As the end of 2009 crept upon us, every publication started dropping their “best of decade” lists. I certainly could have done that with this year’s RT 20. Yet I wanted to mark my 20th anniversary with something a bit more wide ranging. So I hatched the crazy idea to make another radio special (the CDs that came with the print version of the RT 20) to discuss albums that were life-changing for yours truly. Now these aren’t what I consider the best albums of the past 20 years (that list might feature a couple of the same albums), just the ones that had a big impact on what I listened to, what I saw, and sometimes, how I could feel on a certain day. I talk about these albums during the special, but I figured a little bit of extra explanation never hurt.
Young Fresh Fellows - Hits From the Break Up Album (ESC Brand)
Year Released: 1991 Track Featured in Special: “Two Guitars, Bass and Drums”
Nirvana - Nevermind (DCG)
Year Released: 1991 Track Featured in Special: “On a Plain”
Robyn Hitchcock & The Egyptians - Perspex Island (A&M)
Year Released: 1991 Tracks Featured in Special: “Oceanside,” “So You Think You’re in Love”
1991 was a pretty interesting year. I graduated from college, I had a radio job, had it revoked when I showed up for the final interview, I moved home for another radio gig, hated it, quit and then moved back to the city where I went to college—all in the space of five months. I did a whole heck’uva lot of driving those few months. The one cassette that got a lot of car play during that time was Perspex Island. John Cooper of PYX 106 (still one of the best on air talents I’ve ever heard) gave it to me during my last week at the radio station. I was a fan of Hitchcock before Perspex Island was released, but this album connected with me more than any of his other releases during my time in college. Perhaps it was because listening to it made me feel like I was still in college. Or maybe the fact that it was the slickest thing he had done to date. Producer Paul Fox had worked on XTC’s 1989 album Oranges and Lemons and he knew how to make pop songs soar. Perspex Island had a vegetable basket full of them. I dove head first into the Hitchcock catalog in the months after I got that cassette, and have remained a big fan ever since.
Young Fresh Fellows’ Hits From the Break Up Album came out in May of 1991, but I didn’t track down this very limited box set of singles until eight years later. Yet just like Perspex Island, the Break Up Album changed me from a casual fan into a hardcore one. The set is made up of five singles the Fellows released from the fall of 1990 through the winter of 1991. My college station played three of those singles, and all three of them quickly became my favorite Fellows songs. It’s not only the music of the Break Up Album that set me down the path to being a insane Fellows fan who owns almost everything they’ve done. (Which, trust me, is a lot.) The idea of a band putting together the singles in a box with special artwork, a huge poster with liner notes explaining the whole project and a random romance novel appealed to the collector in me. These guys not only how to make great music, they knew how to make a great presentation of that music. I suppose that’s why I have over 315 Fellows songs in my iTunes—and it still doesn’t seem like enough.
And what can I say about Nevermind that hasn’t already been said? The way those 42 minutes and 30 seconds of music (not counting the hidden track) changed the music industry and radio is undeniable. Alas, in hindsight, what came after the trio’s breakthrough isn’t that pretty. Massive signing bonuses for watered down bands; alternative stations in markets that probably couldn’t support the format; Gavin Rossdale. Oy. Maybe Kurt Cobain saw it coming and just couldn’t handle that responsibility. (Or Courtney Love had him killed, whatever.) I listened to Nevermind all the way through for the first time in ages while writing the above paragraphs. And I must say that, just like me, it hasn’t aged well. The Andy Wallace mix seems a bit over the top now and locks the sound completely into the late ’80s/early ’90s. I can say that the songs that haven’t been played to death on the airwaves (“Stay Away,” “On a Plain”) can still bring back some of that initial power I felt back in the fall of 1991. It was a feeling that anything can happen. Alas, real life has a way of derailing those feelings.
The Jayhawks - Hollywood Town Hall (Def American)
Year Released: 1992 Track Featured in Special: “Waiting for the Sun”
Los Lobos - Kiko (Slash/WB)
Year Released: 1992 Tracks Featured in Special: “Dream in Blue,” “Reva’s House”
I worked on air in Ithaca for the first eight months of 1992 on Q104, which was a softer mainstream rock station that dropped in a few “modern rock” bands as a nod to the huge student population in town. I remember reading about the new Los Lobos album and couldn’t wait to hear it. The PD at Q104, Mimi Griswold, gave me an extra copy of the disc she received right after it hit stores. I quickly became fixated on the sound of Kiko and listened to it almost every night (or day, once I switched to working overnights full time) before I went to bed. I wrote a piece in Go Metric #22 in 2008 that sums up my thoughts about it pretty well:
“This was a far cry from the commercial heights of La Bamba. Kiko sounded like nothing before it—and perhaps nothing since. Percussion tracks could resemble someone stumbling through a bunch of trash cans after a night of getting wrecked on Pabst. Guitar tones eerily imitated crying voices. Woodwinds were stacked upon woodwinds, creating combinations that sound neither like a sax or a flute. The lyrics didn’t always tell full stories—they hinted at what happened, letting the listener’s imagination take hold and come to their own conclusion. Kiko is the album that turned this writer from a Los Lobos fan to a fan.”
In the fall of 1992 I moved on to work at 94 K-Rock in Utica, and once again Mimi was the PD. She gave me all the “modern rock” albums that came in for the alternative show I did on Monday nights called 94 Minutes. One of those discs I received was Hollywood Town Hall. I hadn’t heard the term alt-country at the time, but I sure knew great harmonies and Neil Young-inspired lead guitar when I heard it. I didn’t know what it was an “alternative” to, but I sure knew I liked it. As you’ll see as this list moves on, I fell hard for alt-country bands. And it started all right here.
Buffalo Tom - Big Red Letter Day (Beggars Banquet/East West)
Year Released: 1993 Track Featured in Special: “Suppose”
Pearl Jam - Vs. (Epic)
Year Released: 1993 Track Featured in Special: “Dissident”
In 1993 I discovered one could wear a tape out in a car deck. That album was Big Red Letter Day. I still have that cassette for sentimental reasons (even though the oxide started peeling off). Buffalo Tom (and Bill Janovitz in particular) showed me that modern rock bands could be just as soulful as the classic rock bands I listened to in high school. And I’m pretty sure that this was the album that made me raise the bar for what I thought was worthy enough to make the RT 20 over the years.
I am still the biggest Pearl Jam far I know. I don’t know anybody who owns more than a couple of Pearl Jam official bootlegs. I have over 100. And it all started in 1993. I thought 1991’s Ten was an okay album. But I liked all the b-sides and non-album tracks that came out during Ten’s mega-commercial run more than anything on the album itself. So I guess those cuts were priming me for a more muscular and rawer sounding Pearl Jam. And oh my do they deliver on Vs. I never thought I would become a hardcore fan of such a popular group. And I never imagined I would still be one 15 years later.
Weezer - Weezer (DGC)
Year Released: 1994 Track Featured in Special: “Say It Ain’t So”
The Figgs - Low-Fi at Society High (Imago)
Year Released: 1994 Tracks Featured in Special: “Ginger,” “Shut”
Pavement - Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain (Matador)
Year Released: 1994 Tracks Featured in Special: “Silence Kit,” “Gold Soundz”
1994 was a damn fine year for music. I think one of the best in my entire life, quite honestly. And out of all that quality music, these three albums had the longest lasting impact on my life. I’ve typed enough words about The Figgs as this point to probably write a book about the band. I can’t imagine my life without them. I can imagine my life now without Weezer because, my oh my, their last three albums are such pieces of crap. But The Blue Album will always hold a special place in my musical heart for introducing me to a band I couldn’t get enough of for a decade. And Pavement’s impact on my life is pretty wide ranging, as I think they were a gateway for me to a lot of what is now known as indie rock. They were weird, but just catchy enough for me to dig them. And I dig them enough to buy a ticket for one of their reunion concerts a year before it happens. Which is downright insane.
Wilco - Being There (Reprise)
Year Released: 1996 Tracks Featured in Special: “Monday,” “Outtasite (Outta Mind)”
Whiskeytown - Stranger’s Almanac (Outpost)
Year Released: 1997 Tracks Featured in Special: “Excuse Me While I Break My Own Heart Tonight,” “16 Days”
Old 97s - Fight Songs (Elektra)
Year Released: 1999 Tracks Featured in Special: “Jagged,” “Nineteen”
The Bottle Rockets - Brand New Year (Doolittle/Slipdisc/Mercury)
Year Released: 1999 Tracks Featured in Special: “Gotta Get Up,” “Love Like a Truck”
As I wrote above in The Jayhawks entry, I really got into alt-country. If Hollywood Town Hall opened the door for me into that genre of music, these four albums issued over three years blasted that door away, threw me into the house and set me up at the kitchen table so I could sink its teeth into its bones. (And yes, it is dinner time right now, how did you ever guess? And yes, Being There is truly more than alt-country.)
Just like The Figgs, I can’t imagine my life without Wilco. And the first two singles from this double disc, “Outtasite (Outta Mind)” and “Monday,” never fail to make me feel better. I got to see the band for the first time a month after Being There was released, and it was such a cathartic and joyous experience that I’ve only missed five of their New York shows over the past 13 years. Wilco have made better records since, but they’ve never made an album brings me as much child-like joy as this one.
Whiskeytown’s Strangers Almanac might be the best depressing album since Blood on the Tracks. What I wrote five years ago (in the “15 albums I missed” list) still holds true: “The songs on this first half of this album are so depressing that listening to it when I came home unhappy made my own shortcomings seem less imposing. Pining for that girl that lives thousands of miles away? Put on the opening track, ‘Inn Town.’ Upset that your moves on a certain girl didn’t work at a party? Skip directly to track two, ‘Excuse If I Break My Own Heart Tonight.’ Can’t get a certain person to fall for you after a concert, despite the mounting evidence that the two of you would be a good couple? Try track five, ‘Everything I Do.’ I like a full-service depression effort.”
Old 97s and The Bottle Rockets also fit snugly in the world of alt-country, but come at it from different angles. Old 97’s approach it with a pop ear, as singer Rhett Miller writes gems about unrequited love and broken hearts with a perfect balance of hooks and country twang that warms the cockles of my heart. The Bottle Rockets approach it from, well, the beer side. Brand New Year is an album that rocks. And when I say rocks, I mean it’s one of those stupid, big riff-filled, pounding a six pack of beer to, ROCK in capitol letters type of albums that came out in the ’70s. It’s like a Molly Hatchet or Outlaws record, but done by people who have talent. Singer Brian Henneman spits out lyrics like someone stole the last shot of whiskey he ordered (and back then, before he quit drinking, that might have been the case). Both of these albums inspired me to seek out each of their respective catalogs, and I’ve been rewarded ever since.
The Gentlemen - Ladies and Gentlemen (Hearbox/QDivision)
Year Released: 2000 Tracks Featured in Special: “Off With Its Head,” “Through With You”
I could probably write an entire RT 20 about the various reasons I’ve needed to listen to this album over the past nine years. Except I couldn’t do that while listening to it, because I lose focus whenever I hear the opening notes to “Sour Mash.” It took me 10 minutes to write that first line because when the disc started, I just sat at my keyboard, not typing, enjoying the AC/DC-meets-Elvis Costello-crossed-with-The Faces sound of Ladies and Gentlemen. How did this album change my life? I’m not sure. But I know that my life wouldn’t be as good without it.
Bright Eyes - I’m Wide Awake Its Morning (Saddle Creek)
Year Released: 2005 Tracks Featured in Special: “First Day Of My Life,” “We Are Nowhere And It’s Now”
Josh Rouse - Nashville (Rykodisc)
Year Released: 2005 Tracks Featured in Special: “It’s the Nighttime,” “Carolina”
Spoon - Gimme Fiction (Merge)
Year Released: 2005 Tracks Featured in Special: “My Mathematical Mind,” “Sister Jack”
Nada Surf - The Weight is a Gift (Barsuk)
Year Released: 2005 Tracks Featured in Special: “Do It Again,” “Blankest Year”
2005 was one of the momentous years of my life. I discovered a new way to listen to music (the iPod), became good friends with someone whose enthusiasm about music rubbed off on me and inspired me (the concert pal, Moria Miller) and I discovered the awesomeness that is being the front guy for a band (Bunnie England and the New Originals). If I hadn’t gotten emotionally screwed over so much, it would have been the best year ever. And just like 1994, 2005 is certainly in the running for the best year of my musical life. These four albums had a huge influence on what I’ve listened to in the past four years. I ended up getting the entire catalogs of all four acts and made sure to see them at almost every performance they’ve done in the New York area. And I can honestly say that if I had to narrow these 20 years to down to just five albums (like on the RT 20 podcasts), The Weight is a Gift and Nashville would be in there. Both albums are stepped in heartbreak but find a way to turn that negative into a positive. That’s a talent I wish I could master.
Okkervil River - The Stage Names (Jagjaguwar)
Year Released: 2007 Tracks Featured in Special: “Plus Ones,” “Unless It’s Kicks”
The Stage Names helped me rediscover how fulfilling a set of great lyrics can be. Exhibit a, “Plus Ones.” On the surface it seems like a typical picking apart of a failed relationship. Then one look at a lyric sheet shows just how incredible this song is:
“You would probably die before you shot up 9 miles high
Your eyes dilated as light plays upon the sight
Of TVC16 as it sings you goodnight.
Relaxed as hell and locked up in cell 45,
I hope you're feeling better.
The 51st way to leave your lover, admittedly,
doesn't seem to be as gentle or as clean as all the others,
leaving its scars all in the after hours of some Greenpoint bar”
Will Sheff has a way with words as good as any songwriter of the past decade. And he might be the only songwriter that makes me feel smarter after listening to one of his albums.
Young Fresh Fellows - Hits From the Break Up Album (ESC Brand)
Year Released: 1991 Track Featured in Special: “Two Guitars, Bass and Drums”
Nirvana - Nevermind (DCG)
Year Released: 1991 Track Featured in Special: “On a Plain”
Robyn Hitchcock & The Egyptians - Perspex Island (A&M)
Year Released: 1991 Tracks Featured in Special: “Oceanside,” “So You Think You’re in Love”
1991 was a pretty interesting year. I graduated from college, I had a radio job, had it revoked when I showed up for the final interview, I moved home for another radio gig, hated it, quit and then moved back to the city where I went to college—all in the space of five months. I did a whole heck’uva lot of driving those few months. The one cassette that got a lot of car play during that time was Perspex Island. John Cooper of PYX 106 (still one of the best on air talents I’ve ever heard) gave it to me during my last week at the radio station. I was a fan of Hitchcock before Perspex Island was released, but this album connected with me more than any of his other releases during my time in college. Perhaps it was because listening to it made me feel like I was still in college. Or maybe the fact that it was the slickest thing he had done to date. Producer Paul Fox had worked on XTC’s 1989 album Oranges and Lemons and he knew how to make pop songs soar. Perspex Island had a vegetable basket full of them. I dove head first into the Hitchcock catalog in the months after I got that cassette, and have remained a big fan ever since.
Young Fresh Fellows’ Hits From the Break Up Album came out in May of 1991, but I didn’t track down this very limited box set of singles until eight years later. Yet just like Perspex Island, the Break Up Album changed me from a casual fan into a hardcore one. The set is made up of five singles the Fellows released from the fall of 1990 through the winter of 1991. My college station played three of those singles, and all three of them quickly became my favorite Fellows songs. It’s not only the music of the Break Up Album that set me down the path to being a insane Fellows fan who owns almost everything they’ve done. (Which, trust me, is a lot.) The idea of a band putting together the singles in a box with special artwork, a huge poster with liner notes explaining the whole project and a random romance novel appealed to the collector in me. These guys not only how to make great music, they knew how to make a great presentation of that music. I suppose that’s why I have over 315 Fellows songs in my iTunes—and it still doesn’t seem like enough.
And what can I say about Nevermind that hasn’t already been said? The way those 42 minutes and 30 seconds of music (not counting the hidden track) changed the music industry and radio is undeniable. Alas, in hindsight, what came after the trio’s breakthrough isn’t that pretty. Massive signing bonuses for watered down bands; alternative stations in markets that probably couldn’t support the format; Gavin Rossdale. Oy. Maybe Kurt Cobain saw it coming and just couldn’t handle that responsibility. (Or Courtney Love had him killed, whatever.) I listened to Nevermind all the way through for the first time in ages while writing the above paragraphs. And I must say that, just like me, it hasn’t aged well. The Andy Wallace mix seems a bit over the top now and locks the sound completely into the late ’80s/early ’90s. I can say that the songs that haven’t been played to death on the airwaves (“Stay Away,” “On a Plain”) can still bring back some of that initial power I felt back in the fall of 1991. It was a feeling that anything can happen. Alas, real life has a way of derailing those feelings.
The Jayhawks - Hollywood Town Hall (Def American)
Year Released: 1992 Track Featured in Special: “Waiting for the Sun”
Los Lobos - Kiko (Slash/WB)
Year Released: 1992 Tracks Featured in Special: “Dream in Blue,” “Reva’s House”
I worked on air in Ithaca for the first eight months of 1992 on Q104, which was a softer mainstream rock station that dropped in a few “modern rock” bands as a nod to the huge student population in town. I remember reading about the new Los Lobos album and couldn’t wait to hear it. The PD at Q104, Mimi Griswold, gave me an extra copy of the disc she received right after it hit stores. I quickly became fixated on the sound of Kiko and listened to it almost every night (or day, once I switched to working overnights full time) before I went to bed. I wrote a piece in Go Metric #22 in 2008 that sums up my thoughts about it pretty well:
“This was a far cry from the commercial heights of La Bamba. Kiko sounded like nothing before it—and perhaps nothing since. Percussion tracks could resemble someone stumbling through a bunch of trash cans after a night of getting wrecked on Pabst. Guitar tones eerily imitated crying voices. Woodwinds were stacked upon woodwinds, creating combinations that sound neither like a sax or a flute. The lyrics didn’t always tell full stories—they hinted at what happened, letting the listener’s imagination take hold and come to their own conclusion. Kiko is the album that turned this writer from a Los Lobos fan to a fan.”
In the fall of 1992 I moved on to work at 94 K-Rock in Utica, and once again Mimi was the PD. She gave me all the “modern rock” albums that came in for the alternative show I did on Monday nights called 94 Minutes. One of those discs I received was Hollywood Town Hall. I hadn’t heard the term alt-country at the time, but I sure knew great harmonies and Neil Young-inspired lead guitar when I heard it. I didn’t know what it was an “alternative” to, but I sure knew I liked it. As you’ll see as this list moves on, I fell hard for alt-country bands. And it started all right here.
Buffalo Tom - Big Red Letter Day (Beggars Banquet/East West)
Year Released: 1993 Track Featured in Special: “Suppose”
Pearl Jam - Vs. (Epic)
Year Released: 1993 Track Featured in Special: “Dissident”
In 1993 I discovered one could wear a tape out in a car deck. That album was Big Red Letter Day. I still have that cassette for sentimental reasons (even though the oxide started peeling off). Buffalo Tom (and Bill Janovitz in particular) showed me that modern rock bands could be just as soulful as the classic rock bands I listened to in high school. And I’m pretty sure that this was the album that made me raise the bar for what I thought was worthy enough to make the RT 20 over the years.
I am still the biggest Pearl Jam far I know. I don’t know anybody who owns more than a couple of Pearl Jam official bootlegs. I have over 100. And it all started in 1993. I thought 1991’s Ten was an okay album. But I liked all the b-sides and non-album tracks that came out during Ten’s mega-commercial run more than anything on the album itself. So I guess those cuts were priming me for a more muscular and rawer sounding Pearl Jam. And oh my do they deliver on Vs. I never thought I would become a hardcore fan of such a popular group. And I never imagined I would still be one 15 years later.
Weezer - Weezer (DGC)
Year Released: 1994 Track Featured in Special: “Say It Ain’t So”
The Figgs - Low-Fi at Society High (Imago)
Year Released: 1994 Tracks Featured in Special: “Ginger,” “Shut”
Pavement - Crooked Rain, Crooked Rain (Matador)
Year Released: 1994 Tracks Featured in Special: “Silence Kit,” “Gold Soundz”
1994 was a damn fine year for music. I think one of the best in my entire life, quite honestly. And out of all that quality music, these three albums had the longest lasting impact on my life. I’ve typed enough words about The Figgs as this point to probably write a book about the band. I can’t imagine my life without them. I can imagine my life now without Weezer because, my oh my, their last three albums are such pieces of crap. But The Blue Album will always hold a special place in my musical heart for introducing me to a band I couldn’t get enough of for a decade. And Pavement’s impact on my life is pretty wide ranging, as I think they were a gateway for me to a lot of what is now known as indie rock. They were weird, but just catchy enough for me to dig them. And I dig them enough to buy a ticket for one of their reunion concerts a year before it happens. Which is downright insane.
Wilco - Being There (Reprise)
Year Released: 1996 Tracks Featured in Special: “Monday,” “Outtasite (Outta Mind)”
Whiskeytown - Stranger’s Almanac (Outpost)
Year Released: 1997 Tracks Featured in Special: “Excuse Me While I Break My Own Heart Tonight,” “16 Days”
Old 97s - Fight Songs (Elektra)
Year Released: 1999 Tracks Featured in Special: “Jagged,” “Nineteen”
The Bottle Rockets - Brand New Year (Doolittle/Slipdisc/Mercury)
Year Released: 1999 Tracks Featured in Special: “Gotta Get Up,” “Love Like a Truck”
As I wrote above in The Jayhawks entry, I really got into alt-country. If Hollywood Town Hall opened the door for me into that genre of music, these four albums issued over three years blasted that door away, threw me into the house and set me up at the kitchen table so I could sink its teeth into its bones. (And yes, it is dinner time right now, how did you ever guess? And yes, Being There is truly more than alt-country.)
Just like The Figgs, I can’t imagine my life without Wilco. And the first two singles from this double disc, “Outtasite (Outta Mind)” and “Monday,” never fail to make me feel better. I got to see the band for the first time a month after Being There was released, and it was such a cathartic and joyous experience that I’ve only missed five of their New York shows over the past 13 years. Wilco have made better records since, but they’ve never made an album brings me as much child-like joy as this one.
Whiskeytown’s Strangers Almanac might be the best depressing album since Blood on the Tracks. What I wrote five years ago (in the “15 albums I missed” list) still holds true: “The songs on this first half of this album are so depressing that listening to it when I came home unhappy made my own shortcomings seem less imposing. Pining for that girl that lives thousands of miles away? Put on the opening track, ‘Inn Town.’ Upset that your moves on a certain girl didn’t work at a party? Skip directly to track two, ‘Excuse If I Break My Own Heart Tonight.’ Can’t get a certain person to fall for you after a concert, despite the mounting evidence that the two of you would be a good couple? Try track five, ‘Everything I Do.’ I like a full-service depression effort.”
Old 97s and The Bottle Rockets also fit snugly in the world of alt-country, but come at it from different angles. Old 97’s approach it with a pop ear, as singer Rhett Miller writes gems about unrequited love and broken hearts with a perfect balance of hooks and country twang that warms the cockles of my heart. The Bottle Rockets approach it from, well, the beer side. Brand New Year is an album that rocks. And when I say rocks, I mean it’s one of those stupid, big riff-filled, pounding a six pack of beer to, ROCK in capitol letters type of albums that came out in the ’70s. It’s like a Molly Hatchet or Outlaws record, but done by people who have talent. Singer Brian Henneman spits out lyrics like someone stole the last shot of whiskey he ordered (and back then, before he quit drinking, that might have been the case). Both of these albums inspired me to seek out each of their respective catalogs, and I’ve been rewarded ever since.
The Gentlemen - Ladies and Gentlemen (Hearbox/QDivision)
Year Released: 2000 Tracks Featured in Special: “Off With Its Head,” “Through With You”
I could probably write an entire RT 20 about the various reasons I’ve needed to listen to this album over the past nine years. Except I couldn’t do that while listening to it, because I lose focus whenever I hear the opening notes to “Sour Mash.” It took me 10 minutes to write that first line because when the disc started, I just sat at my keyboard, not typing, enjoying the AC/DC-meets-Elvis Costello-crossed-with-The Faces sound of Ladies and Gentlemen. How did this album change my life? I’m not sure. But I know that my life wouldn’t be as good without it.
Bright Eyes - I’m Wide Awake Its Morning (Saddle Creek)
Year Released: 2005 Tracks Featured in Special: “First Day Of My Life,” “We Are Nowhere And It’s Now”
Josh Rouse - Nashville (Rykodisc)
Year Released: 2005 Tracks Featured in Special: “It’s the Nighttime,” “Carolina”
Spoon - Gimme Fiction (Merge)
Year Released: 2005 Tracks Featured in Special: “My Mathematical Mind,” “Sister Jack”
Nada Surf - The Weight is a Gift (Barsuk)
Year Released: 2005 Tracks Featured in Special: “Do It Again,” “Blankest Year”
2005 was one of the momentous years of my life. I discovered a new way to listen to music (the iPod), became good friends with someone whose enthusiasm about music rubbed off on me and inspired me (the concert pal, Moria Miller) and I discovered the awesomeness that is being the front guy for a band (Bunnie England and the New Originals). If I hadn’t gotten emotionally screwed over so much, it would have been the best year ever. And just like 1994, 2005 is certainly in the running for the best year of my musical life. These four albums had a huge influence on what I’ve listened to in the past four years. I ended up getting the entire catalogs of all four acts and made sure to see them at almost every performance they’ve done in the New York area. And I can honestly say that if I had to narrow these 20 years to down to just five albums (like on the RT 20 podcasts), The Weight is a Gift and Nashville would be in there. Both albums are stepped in heartbreak but find a way to turn that negative into a positive. That’s a talent I wish I could master.
Okkervil River - The Stage Names (Jagjaguwar)
Year Released: 2007 Tracks Featured in Special: “Plus Ones,” “Unless It’s Kicks”
The Stage Names helped me rediscover how fulfilling a set of great lyrics can be. Exhibit a, “Plus Ones.” On the surface it seems like a typical picking apart of a failed relationship. Then one look at a lyric sheet shows just how incredible this song is:
“You would probably die before you shot up 9 miles high
Your eyes dilated as light plays upon the sight
Of TVC16 as it sings you goodnight.
Relaxed as hell and locked up in cell 45,
I hope you're feeling better.
The 51st way to leave your lover, admittedly,
doesn't seem to be as gentle or as clean as all the others,
leaving its scars all in the after hours of some Greenpoint bar”
Will Sheff has a way with words as good as any songwriter of the past decade. And he might be the only songwriter that makes me feel smarter after listening to one of his albums.
Tuesday, December 15, 2009
RT 20 Podcast 25: Moria Miller
The last podcast before the 20th edition of the RT 20 hits the mail is with my good friend Moria Miller. I met her at the end of 2004 through a bartending friend Drew, who has since fallen out of touch. She had just moved down here from Boston and we discovered we knew some of the people from the music scene up there. I quickly realized that we also had the ability to shoot the shit via email like nobody's business. I estimate we sent about 1000 emails back and forth in the first six months we knew each other. And about 80% of those were about music. Her enthusiasm about acts that I knew but didn't pay attention to (Josh Rouse), knew one song from (Spoon) or thought I hated (Bright Eyes) or ones I already loved (Weezer) inspired me to take chances on new music more than ever before. When I got an iPod in March of '05, she was the first person I emailed because I knew she would understand why I was so excited. I probably would have gotten an iPod that year anyways, but I don't think I would have started exploring the Internet for new bands like I did that year without getting to know her. It was
Moria was also instrumental in getting me off my ass to go see shows again. And holy crap, did I see a ton of great music in 2005. That year I saw as many shows as I had in the previous four combined. It was refreshing to see new (well, new to me) acts throughout that year (The Shins, Rilo Kiley, White Stripes, Eisley) after falling into a rut where only the band I would always see was The Figgs. And I felt happy I was able to take her to see some of my favorites she had never seen before (Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Paul Westerberg).
She's probably embarrassed by the above paragraphs. But I felt that I needed explain just how much her friendship did for my life that year, and the years since. So thanks, MM. I will miss having a concert pal once you leave town. (Which I know is true because she's not fated to live in Brooklyn forever like yours truly.)
To download through iTunes click here. To download (or stream) the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Moria was also instrumental in getting me off my ass to go see shows again. And holy crap, did I see a ton of great music in 2005. That year I saw as many shows as I had in the previous four combined. It was refreshing to see new (well, new to me) acts throughout that year (The Shins, Rilo Kiley, White Stripes, Eisley) after falling into a rut where only the band I would always see was The Figgs. And I felt happy I was able to take her to see some of my favorites she had never seen before (Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, Paul Westerberg).
She's probably embarrassed by the above paragraphs. But I felt that I needed explain just how much her friendship did for my life that year, and the years since. So thanks, MM. I will miss having a concert pal once you leave town. (Which I know is true because she's not fated to live in Brooklyn forever like yours truly.)
To download through iTunes click here. To download (or stream) the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Song of the Week 12/11/09
Soul Asylum - "Hopes Up"
My friend Mike Schmidt picked Let Your Dim Light Shine as one of the five albums that changed his life over the past two decades for his edition of the RT 20 Podcast. Listening to the podcast on the train ride home Sunday night, hearing "Hopes Up" brought back a ton of memories about the end of the first chapter of my life (on air in upstate New York) and how it led into the second chapter (moving to Brooklyn). I'm pretty sure that "Hopes Up" and "Bittersweetheart" is my favorite double shot of the whole podcast series. Thanks for picking them, Mike.
My friend Mike Schmidt picked Let Your Dim Light Shine as one of the five albums that changed his life over the past two decades for his edition of the RT 20 Podcast. Listening to the podcast on the train ride home Sunday night, hearing "Hopes Up" brought back a ton of memories about the end of the first chapter of my life (on air in upstate New York) and how it led into the second chapter (moving to Brooklyn). I'm pretty sure that "Hopes Up" and "Bittersweetheart" is my favorite double shot of the whole podcast series. Thanks for picking them, Mike.
Monday, December 14, 2009
RT 20 Podcast 23 & 24: Lee Greenfeld, Parts 1 & 2
Lee had a big impact on my late 30s as a co-owner of the late great Magnetic Field. It was there where I met the guys in Bunnie England and the New Originals and discovered the joy of being on stage again.
(Note: Both podcasts should be up there at some point today. The second one is being tricky. I think in 2010 I'll be switching to a different server. I'll warn you when that happens so you can update the XML feed in iTunes.)
To download through iTunes click here. To download (or stream) the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
(Note: Both podcasts should be up there at some point today. The second one is being tricky. I think in 2010 I'll be switching to a different server. I'll warn you when that happens so you can update the XML feed in iTunes.)
To download through iTunes click here. To download (or stream) the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
RT 20 Podcast 22: Mike Schmidt
Mike and I started a band together in Utica. Alas, I left town before we ever found a drummer. You'll hear more memories like that, as well as selections from five great records, in this lengthy podcast.
To download through iTunes click here. To download (or stream) the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
To download through iTunes click here. To download (or stream) the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Saturday, December 12, 2009
RT 20 Podcast 20 & 21: Dev Sherlock, Part 1 & 2
(Holy crap, I can't believe I finally got these posted after three days of frustration. Stupid podcast server.)
Dev and I worked together for a number of years, coming up with a multitude of inside jokes that probably drove anyone not in our cube area completely insane. This two part podcast features the longest song in this entire series. (I think I'm pretty safe saying that, because when I continue these podcasts in January I doubt that anyone will pick "In a Gadda da Vida" or "Mountain Jam.")
To download through iTunes click here. To download (or stream) the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Dev and I worked together for a number of years, coming up with a multitude of inside jokes that probably drove anyone not in our cube area completely insane. This two part podcast features the longest song in this entire series. (I think I'm pretty safe saying that, because when I continue these podcasts in January I doubt that anyone will pick "In a Gadda da Vida" or "Mountain Jam.")
To download through iTunes click here. To download (or stream) the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Wednesday, December 09, 2009
RT 20 Podcast 19: John Ross Bowie, Part 2
Here's the second part of one funny podcast. (And it even features a couple of songs I don't like!)
To download through iTunes click here. To download (or stream) the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
To download through iTunes click here. To download (or stream) the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Tuesday, December 08, 2009
RT 20 Podcast 18: John Ross Bowie, Part 1
Some of you might remember John from such things as:
--His guest stint as the commercial director on Glee last week.
--Kripke on The Big Bang Theory.
--The dentist in Sex Drive.
--A dentist on Psych.
--The singer-bassist in Egghead.
--Or this guy:
I remember him from all of those, but mainly I remember the almost 20 years of friendship we've had so far.
WARNING: Both parts of this podcast are so funny, I suggest not listening to it while you're behind the wheel. I don't want any accidents on my conscience.
To download through iTunes click here. To download (or stream) the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
--His guest stint as the commercial director on Glee last week.
--Kripke on The Big Bang Theory.
--The dentist in Sex Drive.
--A dentist on Psych.
--The singer-bassist in Egghead.
--Or this guy:
I remember him from all of those, but mainly I remember the almost 20 years of friendship we've had so far.
WARNING: Both parts of this podcast are so funny, I suggest not listening to it while you're behind the wheel. I don't want any accidents on my conscience.
To download through iTunes click here. To download (or stream) the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Monday, December 07, 2009
RT 20 Podcast 17: Jonah Eller-Isaacs
Jonah is the bravest friend I have. You can find out why at Groinstrong.
He also picked some interesting tunes for this podcast, most of which I had never heard before.
To download through iTunes click here. To download the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
He also picked some interesting tunes for this podcast, most of which I had never heard before.
To download through iTunes click here. To download the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Song of the Week 12/4/09
The Figgs - "Casino Hayes"
I love gambling. I love The Figgs. Bringing these two interests together in the service of one song? Why didn’t this happen sooner?!!?
I love gambling. I love The Figgs. Bringing these two interests together in the service of one song? Why didn’t this happen sooner?!!?
Friday, December 04, 2009
RT 20 Podcast 16: Michelle Ferrara & Ben Wheelock, Part 2
Here's the second part of my conversation Michelle and Ben, which closes with a classic song.
To download through iTunes click here. To download the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
To download through iTunes click here. To download the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Thursday, December 03, 2009
RT 20 Podcast 15: Michelle Ferrara and Ben Wheelock, Part 1
Today's podcast is the only podcast to feature a married couple. Michelle and Ben are the most musical couple I know. Music played a huge part in their wedding* back in April (which we discuss) and both of them are fine musicians in their own right. In fact, I became friends with Michelle because she was the singer/host of Live Band Karaoke at Magnetic Field before I joined Bunnie England & the New Originals. It took the three of us a bit to get going, but by the second part my comments are practically insane. You'll enjoy it, trust me.
(*I'm still waiting to see the picture of myself with the stupid hat on, hint hint.)
To download through iTunes click here. To download the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
(*I'm still waiting to see the picture of myself with the stupid hat on, hint hint.)
To download through iTunes click here. To download the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Wednesday, December 02, 2009
RT 20 Podcast 14: Joe Savastano, Part 2
More conversation, music and laughter with my old roommate Joe.
To download through iTunes click here. To download the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
To download through iTunes click here. To download the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Monday, November 30, 2009
RT 20 Podcast 13: Joe Savastano, Part 1
The amount of crazy adventures Joe and I have shared over the past two decades could probably fill up an entire book. (Or would have made a kick ass reality show.) We met doing radio in college, hung out a great deal the year after we graduated college and both lived in Ithaca, and then joined forces in 1995 when we both moved to New York. Our five years as roommates in Brooklyn supplied both of us with a lifetime of crazy (both happy and sad) memories. I couldn't imagine doing this podcast series without one of the best friends a guy could ever have.
To download through iTunes click here. To download the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
To download through iTunes click here. To download the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Friday, November 27, 2009
Song of the Week 11/27/09
Miley Cyrus - "Party in the U.S.A."
Seriously.
I'm not joking.
It's been stuck in my head all week. And I guess I shouldn't be surprised since Dr. Luke, who co-wrote "Since You've Been Gone," co-wrote this one as well.
And you know what's just as crazy as me liking this teenybopper song? This video:
Seriously.
I'm not joking.
It's been stuck in my head all week. And I guess I shouldn't be surprised since Dr. Luke, who co-wrote "Since You've Been Gone," co-wrote this one as well.
And you know what's just as crazy as me liking this teenybopper song? This video:
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
RT 20 Podcast 12: Victor Lisle & Geoff Storm, Part 2
Here's the second part of my chat with my former radio cohorts Victor and Geoff, or, to go by their early 90s radio nicknames, The Tor-Man and Jamming Geoff. Somehow I avoided having a nickname when we worked together at K-Rock.
To download through iTunes click here. To download the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
To download through iTunes click here. To download the MP3, click here and then click on the MP3 button.
Monday, November 23, 2009
Song of the Week 11/20/09
Chris Bell - "I Am the Cosmos"
Big Star's show at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple was pretty damn good Wednesday night. Alex Chilton seemed invested in his own songs, Jody Stephens overcame a couple of flubs behind the drum kit, and The Posies’ Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow, well, they did a great job filling the shoes of the late Chris Bell and the retired-from-music Andy Hummell. Auer’s vocal on “I Am the Cosmos” (the Big Star-ish title track from Bell’s only solo album) was particularly breathtaking, leaving my friend Vanessa stunned by his talent. The night would have been a complete success if I hadn’t caught Vanessa’s cold.
See for yourself:
BONUS: Here's the Posies Frosting on the Beater lineup tackling it. (You can find their studio version on Dream All Day: The Best Of The Posies.)
Big Star's show at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple was pretty damn good Wednesday night. Alex Chilton seemed invested in his own songs, Jody Stephens overcame a couple of flubs behind the drum kit, and The Posies’ Jon Auer and Ken Stringfellow, well, they did a great job filling the shoes of the late Chris Bell and the retired-from-music Andy Hummell. Auer’s vocal on “I Am the Cosmos” (the Big Star-ish title track from Bell’s only solo album) was particularly breathtaking, leaving my friend Vanessa stunned by his talent. The night would have been a complete success if I hadn’t caught Vanessa’s cold.
See for yourself:
BONUS: Here's the Posies Frosting on the Beater lineup tackling it. (You can find their studio version on Dream All Day: The Best Of The Posies.)
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