Rachel Griffin: "A Summer Touch"

Here's wishing a happy birthday to Rachel Griffin, a lovely young lady of song whose voice has graced several episodes of the podcast.



I hope your coming year is full of joys and accomplishments.

Episode 69: Stop Snickering; I Already Did the Sex Show

A no-talking episode. In deference to the inner 12-year-old that is snickering at the episode number, the first and last tracks are a bit randy, but other than that the only theme here is music that I dig.

Here's what you'll hear today (direct download here:

Mean Gene Kelton and the Die Hards, "My Baby Don't Wear No Panties"
Maria Daines, "Slaughterhouse Blues"
Drifting in Silence, "Ladderdown"
Cheaters Club, "Anthony"
The Marble Tea, "Chocolates for Breakfast"
Sirsy, "Soul Sucker"
The Krinkles, "Blinded by Love"
Edward Guglielmino, "Oh Racquel"
Jinx Titanic, "Everyone Here Wants to F--- You"



Tracks 2, 5 and 8 came from the artists' MySpace pages; all others came from the Podsafe Music Network.

No Bizarro Files today due to holiday travel.

Mental Nomad Mix 6: Holiday Reflections

Here's the third of three holiday music mixes that cover Christmas, Hanukkah, Yule, the winter solstice and Kwanzaa in various places. The first mix was more of the secular type of music; the second mix features humorous or odd pieces (with some explicit content); and this mix covers the more spiritual side of things. The link before takes you to iTunes, where you could buy the entire mix or individual tracks for about $1 each.

Mental Nomad Mix 6: Holiday Reflections


Contents:

"Gabriel's Message," Sting -- Amazing vocal work from Sting here.

"Christmas in Prison," John Prine -- A recommendation; this offers a perspective you rarely hear, but who needs cheer more than those behind bars?

"The Atheist Christmas Carol," Vienna Teng -- Lovely vocal work on this song, which was recommended by a friend.

"O Little Town of Bethlehem," Frank Sinatra & Orchestra And Chorus Of Gordon Jenkins -- As said earlier, Sinatra may have been a gruff guy, but he had a real gift for these tender songs.

"Winter Solstice," R. Carlos Nakai -- Nice instrumental jazz piece.

"The Cutty Wren," Jessica Radcliffe, Lisa Ekström & Martin Simpson -- A recommendation here, focusing more on the ancient roots of holiday traditions later adopted by Christianity.

"God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen," Barenaked Ladies & Sarah McLachlan -- Hopefully the Bob Rivers song yesterday won't ruin this one for you.

"Nothing But a Child," Steve Earle -- This tender nativity song comes at the end of Earle's Copperhead Road album; you've got the title track about dealing in illicit substances, the Reagan-bashing "Snake Oil," the veterans' ode "Johnny Come Lately" (with the Pogues) and this -- quite a range on one album.

"The Little Drummer Boy," Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band -- One of the best moments to come out of the A Very Special Christmas albums.

"Melekalikimaka," The Beach Boys -- By request, but I'd have kicked myself if I'd left this off.

"Oiche Chiun (Silent Night)," Enya -- Beautiful vocal work.

"Breath of Heaven (Mary's Song)," Vince Gill -- Another perspective you don't often hear.

"Shir Amami," Jane Siberry -- From an album of Hanukkah-themed music.

"Ave Maria," Luciano Pavarotti -- As Elizabeth Donald says, the mixture of his voice and the music makes this song is a religious experience. (And I say: Go buy her books.)

"Patapan Anon," The Deller Consort -- More with the Yule, a recommendation from a friend.

"Happy Happy Kwanzaa," Bunny Hull -- And Ye Olde Podcaster feels really bad that he ended up with just one song in here representing this cultural festival. I'll try to do better next year.

"O Holy Night," Tracy Chapman -- Beautiful vocals from someone you hear too little.

Mental Nomad Mix 5: Holiday Silliness

Here's the second of three holiday music mixes that cover Christmas, Hanukkah, Yule, the winter solstice and Kwanzaa in various places. This first mix was more of the secular type of music; this mix features humorous or odd pieces; and mix three will cover the more spiritual side of things. The link before takes you to iTunes, where you could buy the entire mix or individual tracks for about $1 each. Warning: Some tracks here are explicit or in questionable taste.

Mental Nomad Mix 5: Holiday Silliness


Contents:

"Chiron Beta Prime," Jonathan Coulton -- A humorous little look at Christmas in the future from this legend of podsafe music.

"The Restroom Door Said, 'Gentleman'" Bob Rivers -- A novelty song you always hear around this time of the year.

"I Saw Mommy Kissing Santa Claus," Dion -- Another novelty song, performed by one of the enduring legends of rock 'n' roll.

"Leroy the Redneck Reindeer," Joe Diffie -- Offered on a friend's recommendation, this is one I haven't heard yet.

"Father Christmas," The Kinks -- Gotta love those wacky feuding Davies brothers. Even their Christmas song was snarky.

"Little Saint Nick (Single Version)," The Beach Boys -- Great harmonies.

"Run Rudolph Run," Chuck Berry -- When you're a member of the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame, can you really churn out a novelty song?

"Walkin' 'Round in Women's Underwear," Bob Rivers -- Another snicker-fest.

"Give the Jew Girl Toys," Sarah Silverman -- A recommendation from a friend.

"Christmas Is Interesting," Jonathan Coulton -- More silly snark from Coulton, about the family drama that comes in the holidays.

"The Little Drum Machine Boy," Beck -- I think you know where that's heading.

"Santa's Gonna Kick Your A*s," Arrogant Worms -- Offered on recommendation.

"Christmas With the Devil," Spinal Tap -- This one goes to 11.

"The Twelve Pains of Christmas," Bob Rivers -- "Hangovers!"

"Santa Claus Got Stuck In My Chimney," Ella Fitzgerald -- Ella had a sense of humor, too.

"Podsafe Christmas Song," Jonathan Coulton -- This is the geekiest song on the list, one you may not get if your only thought when you hear the name "Adam Curry" is "Wasn't he that dude from MTV News?"

"Merry Christmas (I Don't Want to Fight Tonight)," The Ramones -- What a great band these guys were.

"Christmas Wrapping," The Waitresses -- An early-80s flashback for you.

"I Am Santa Claus," Bob Rivers -- To the tune of Black Sabbath's "Iron Man."

"The Chanukah Song," Adam Sandler -- A humorous look at the holidays wouldn't be complete without this piece.

Episode 68: Going With the Flow (Repost)

Minimal talk, mostly just music for your road trip this Thanksgiving. (Reposted with the download link. Sorry about that.)

Here's what you'll hear today (direct download here):

Howard Jones, "Just Look at You Now"
Hubert Sumlin, "The Red Rooster"
Robin Stine, "Daydream"
RAYAE, "Head Meditation"
David Ippolito, "Bill O'Reilly (Legend of the Big Giant Head)"
Bright Eyes, "Lua"
Jack Frost, "Angela Carter"
Glorydive, "Anyone at All"
Asim Ali, "Life's a Cancer"
Ann Wilson, "Where to Now St. Peter"



Tracks 1, 3, 5-6, 8 and 10 came from the Podsafe Music Network. Tracks 2 and 7 come courtesy of the IODA Promonet and can be downloaded below. And tracks four and 9 come courtesy of Garageband.

Hubert Sumlin
"The Red Rooster" (mp3)
from "Heart & Soul"
(Blind Pig Records)
Buy at eMusic
Buy at GroupieTunes
More On This Album



Jack Frost
"Angela Carter" (mp3)
from "Snow Job"
(Karmic Hit)
Buy at iTunes Music Store
Buy at eMusic
Stream from Rhapsody
More On This Album

Mental Nomad Mix 4: Holiday Cheer

Here's the first of three holiday music mixes that cover Christmas, Hanukkah, Yule, the winter solstice and Kwanzaa in various places. This first mix is more of the secular type of music; mix two will be humorous or odd pieces; and mix three will cover the more spiritual side of things. The link before takes you to iTunes, where you could buy the entire mix or individual tracks for about $1 each.

Mental Nomad Mix 4: Holiday Cheer


Contents:

"Blue Christmas," Elvis Presley -- It's not the holiday season unless I hear this song at least once.

"Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas," The Pretenders -- A song so good it got featured on Homicide: Life on the Street.

"Hanukkah Blessings," Barenaked Ladies -- This Canadian band has an album out full of Christmas and Hanukkah tunes.

"Fairytale of New York," The Pogues Featuring Kirsty MacColl -- A nice he-said, she-said set in the backdrop of a New York Christmas.

"River," Travis -- A Joni Mitchell cover requested by a few friends.

"The Christians and the Pagans," Dar Williams -- A story of interfaith understanding.

"Jingle Bells," Frank Sinatra & Orchestra And Chorus Of Gordon Jenkins -- Frank was, by all accounts, a bit cranky, but his Christmas album is one of my favorites.

"Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)," U2 -- Off the legendary A Very Special Christmas album.

"White Christmas (WXPN Version)," The Flaming Lips -- One I haven't heard yet, recommended by a friend. But these guys are terrifically talented.

"Winter Wonderland," James Taylor -- One of the warmest voices in American popular music.

"Christmas in the Trenches," John McCutcheon -- A meditative piece recommended by a friend, taking a look at the holiday from a perspective we never see.

"It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year," Vince Gill -- Another warm voice.

"Santa Claus Is Coming to Town," Ella Fitzgerald -- Recommended by the lovely Elizabeth Donald.

"Please Come Home for Christmas," Jon Bon Jovi -- Man's got some soul.

"The Bells of Dublin/Christmas Eve," The Chieftains & The Bell-Ringers of Christ Church Cathedral, Dublin -- The Chieftains are wonderful at anything they do.

"Happy Xmas (War Is Over)," John Lennon -- Simply beautiful.

"I'll Be Home for Christmas," Aimee Mann -- One of the great underappreciated voices.

"Greensleeves," Vince Guaraldi Trio -- And it's not Christmas without the Charlie Brown Christmas experience.

"The Christmas Song," Michael Wolff & Warren Zevon -- This was recorded for Wolff's album Christmas Moods in Zevon's final months, after he'd been diagnosed with the cancer that would kill him. His voice is weak in places, but his spirit's strong.

Fame by association

Ye Olde Podcaster landed, some time back, in the acknowledgements of Elizabeth Donald's anthology Setting Suns. (And if you don't own a copy of that, shame on you.)

Now Ye Olde Podcaster is going to be in a scholarly library as a footnote.

Fantasy author Sarah Monette is donating her papers to Northern Illinois University's collection of fantasy and science fiction materials -- H.P. Lovecraft's papers are in there, for instance.

Sarah and I met in high school, in 1990, and wrote by my estimation something along the lines of 50-80 pages of comedic fantasy together. We completed one short story over the course of a month, about 20 pages, and then worked on some unfinished stuff expanding upon it as best we could, living four to five hours apart in an age shortly before the Internet.

The library submission will include "juvenalia," the writings from her teenage years, so yeah, I'm a footnote. But I'll take it -- closest I'll get to fame and fortune. Now, to get myself in a CD's credits... :)

Gustav Bertha: "Bullets Have More Eloquence Than Words"

In honor of today's re-mastered re-release of my second episode, here's one of the songs I played in that show.



Is it just me, or does his reading of Jacques Brel's "Next" not lose a bit of its creepiness on each subsequent hearing? That was in last week's spoken word show, if you haven't downloaded it yet.

New episode coming Wednesday, as always.

Episode 2: This Time It's Personal (remastered, bonus tracks)

And here's a bonus show, taking the tracks that were originally in episode two and resequencing them, replacing the vocal bits with something arguably a little bit more listenable, and adding a lot of new music to the mix.

Here's what you'll hear (direct download here):

The Majestic Twelve, "Thank God Everything on TV Is a Lie"
Gustav Bertha: "Bullets Have More Eloquence than Words"
Taco and Da Mofos: "Drink or 2"
2012: "Dream of Freedom"

New tracks:

Alice Gomez: "Forgotten Empires"
Signal to Noise: "The Weather Machine"
Lennon: "Main Gravel Road"
Sharif: "Simple Ways"
Jodie Borle: "Round"
Bad Religion: "Voice of God Is Government"

Bonus track:
Kurt Kreikenbom: "Nothing Blues"



Tracks 4, 6 and 10 come from the Podsafe Music Network; tracks 5, 7 and 9 came from the IODA Promonet. Other tracks came from CD, artist Web sites and/or MySpace.

Lennon
"Main Gravel Road" (mp3)
from "Career Suicide"
(John Galt Entertainment)

Buy at iTunes Music Store
Buy at eMusic
Stream from Rhapsody
More On This Album



Jodie Borlé
"Round" (mp3)
from "And Then I Did..."
(C4 Records)

Buy at iTunes Music Store
Buy at Rhapsody
Stream from Rhapsody
More On This Album



Alice Gomez
"Forgotten Empires" (mp3)
from "Sky Prayer - The Best of Alice Gomez"
(Talking Taco Music)

Buy at iTunes Music Store
Buy at Rhapsody
Stream from Rhapsody
More On This Album

Episode 67: Moron-American Studies

You'll figure out the title of this episode about halfway through. Suffice it to say, it's not about the musicians at all.

Here's what you'll hear today (direct download here):

Deathboy: "Empathy Malfunction"
3dB: "Remnants"
Cowboy Junkies: "I Don't Get It"
Frank Black: "Ten Percenter (live)"
Two If By Sea: "This Will Hurt Someone"
Michelle Hotaling: "Porcelain Doll"
Splitsville: "I'll Never Fall in Love Again"
Lesley Gore: "Ever Since"



Tracks three and four come from the IODA Promonet; tracks six and eight come courtesy of the Podsafe Music Network. The others come from CD or the artist's Web sites and/or MySpace pages.

Frank Black
"Ten Percenter" (mp3)
from "93-03"
(Cooking Vinyl)
Buy at iTunes Music Store
Buy at Rhapsody
Stream from Rhapsody
More On This Album



Cowboy Junkies
"I Don't Get It" (mp3)
from "The Trinity Revisited"
(Cooking Vinyl)
More On This Album

"Birthday Wishes"

And now for something completely different...



Video made by Frank Fradella and entered in a contest YouTube is doing. He isn't on the side of this page yet, but he should be.

Steve Earle: "Rich Man's War"

This being Veterans Day (for another hour or so), it seems the right time to share this. And if I've played it before, well, it's timely enough and sadly no less relevant enough to bear repeating.

Cake: "Never There"

There was an episode of Sex and the City where Carrie's then-beau, Aidan, bonds with her ex (and future) beau, Mr. Big. Big's frustrated with his new girlfriend: "I can never reach her. She can only call me," he says, or words to that effect. Chris Noth hams it up quite well in that scene. Anyway, this song makes me think of that.



(Come on -- watching Sex and the City is like homework if you want to try to understand women at all. It won't help, but at least you're making an effort.)

Maggie Estep: "Hey Baby"

From her album No More Mister Nice Girl:



See also: "I'm an Emotional Idiot, So Get Away from Me," from Def Poetry Jam.

John Legend: "Again"

From HBO's Def Poetry Jam.

Episode 66: Talk Hard

A celebration of the spoken word, with bits of mood music in between.

Here's what you'll hear today (direct download here):

Helen Sventitsky, "Christine"
Leah Cannon, "June 3" (originally recorded for the Another Lousy Day podcast)
Amir Beso, "Mikey's Song"
Reid Harris Cooper, "Western Freestyle"
Minton Sparks, "Sorrow Knows This Dress"
Up Stairs, "Mother's Mandolin"
Jade Walker, "My Faith in Film"
Larry Winfield, "Strip"
R-Three, "Pollen for Honey"
Amir Beso, "Laura's Lullaby"
Gustav Bertha, "Next" (by Jacques Brel)
Up Stairs, "Blasphemy"
Helen Sventitsky, "Mixtape Yerington"
Rob Costlow, "Bliss"



The tracks by Up Stairs and Larry Winfield come courtesy of the Podsafe Music Network. Minton Sparks and Amir Beso's tracks come from CD. The others were submitted by the artists. Musical sounds on Reid's track are public domain from Peter John Ross and Flying Hands. Check out Leah's podcast, the Schmoovecast.

Lou Reed from "Thinking XXX" DVD (obviously NSFW)

Almost like a Spam Slam -- subject lines from spam e-mails read slam poetry-style -- here we have Lou Reed in the bonus features of a DVD I've never heard of, reading descriptions of adult films but could just as easily be reading spam e-mail.



So it's sort of a "spoken word" reading using found material instead of his own composition.

Saul Williams: "Coded Language"

From HBO's Def Poetry Jam.

Alicia Keys: "POW"

From HBO's Def Poetry Jam.



New episode coming tomorrow, full of spoken word bits.

John Cooper Clarke: "Crossing the Floor"

Most Americans have probably only heard this guy once -- when his reading of "Evidently Chickentown" was used at the end of "Stage Five," an episode from the final season of The Sopranos.

muMs: "Is This the End?"

Spoken word from the poet who played an inmate named Poet on HBO's prison drama Oz.



Man, I love this guy's delivery.

Henry Rollins: Thoughts on rave music and modern "rock"

Beginning a mini-stint of spoken word videos ahead of Wednesday's episode.

Amir Beso: "Adriatica"

Here's an artist I've played once on the show and am happy to announce will be featured again very soon.



Wednesday's show: Spoken-word performances by people you've heard before and some new faces.