Song of the day - Falco 6/18/09

Falco - "Der Kommissar"#12 on My Player

Johann (Hans) Hölzel Born in Vienna, studying at the Vienna Music Conservatory in 1977 which he left after one semester to pursue a career in music, he lived for a short time in West Berlin while singing in a jazz-rock band. When he returned to Vienna he was calling himself "Falco," reportedly in tribute to the East German ski jumper Falko Weißpflog, and playing in the Austrian bands Spinning Wheel and Hallucination Company. En route to becoming an international rock star in his own right, he was bass player in the Austrian hard rock-punk rock band Drahdiwaberl (from 1978 until 1983). With Drahdiwaberl he wrote and performed the song "Ganz Wien," which he would also include on his debut solo album, Einzelhaft.

Falco's first hit was "Der Kommissar," from the 1982 album Einzelhaft. A German language song about drug consumption that combines rap verses with a sung chorus, Falco's record was a number-one success in many countries but failed to break big in the U.S. The song, however, would prove to have a life of its own in two English-language versions. British Rock band After the Fire recorded an English cover version, loosely based on Falco's lyrics and also called "Der Kommissar" (with "uh-oh" and "alles klar Herr Kommissar" the only other lyrics held over from the original). This time, the song shot to number three in the United States (their only major hit there) in 1983, though it failed to crack the UK Top 40. The band—who had been together more than a decade—broke up almost immediately thereafter. That same year, American singer Laura Branigan recorded a version of the song with new English lyrics, under the title "Deep In The Dark," on her album Branigan 2.
After a second album, Junge Roemer, failed to provide a repeat to his debut single's success (outside of Austria and Germany, where the album topped the charts), Falco began to experiment with English lyrics in an effort to broaden his appeal, and chose a new production team. The result would be the most popular album and single of his career.
Falco recorded "Rock Me Amadeus" inspired in part by the Oscar-winning film Amadeus, and the song became a worldwide hit in 1986. This time, his record reached #1 in the U.S. and UK, bringing him the success that had eluded him in that major market a few years earlier. The song remained in the top spot of the Billboard Hot 100 for three weeks and his album, Falco 3, fittingly peaked at the number three position on the Billboard album charts. Unheard of at the time for a white performer, much less a European one, the Austrian rapper's single climbed to the upper reaches of the Billboard Top R&B Singles Chart (only a few years earlier called the "Black Singles" chart), peaking at number 6. Falco 3 peaked at number 18 on the Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums charts. Ultimately, "Rock Me Amadeus" went to the #1 spot in over a dozen countries including the Soviet Union and Japan. Follow-up single "Vienna Calling" was another international pop hit, peaking at #18 of the Billboard Charts and #17 on the U.S. Cash Box Charts in 1986. A double A-side 12" single featuring remixes of those two hits peaked at #4 on the U.S. Dance/Disco charts.

"Jeanny," the third release from the album Falco 3, brought the performer back to the top of the charts across Europe. Highly controversial when it was released in Germany and the Netherlands, the story of "Jeanny" was told from the point of view of a rapist and possible murderer. Several DJs and radio stations refused to play the ballad, which was ignored in the U.S., although it became a huge hit in many European countries, and inspired two sequels on later albums.

In 1986, the album Emotional was released, produced by Rob and Ferdi Bolland (Bolland & Bolland). On the Album were "Coming Home (Jeanny Part 2)," and songs about Kathleen Turner and the song "Kamikaze Cappa" which was written as a tribute to the late photojournalist Robert Capa. "The Sound of Musik" was another international success, and a Top 20 U.S. Dance hit, though he failed to make the U.S. pop charts. He also went on "Emotional-Tour" which was a world tour where he ended up in Japan at 1987. In 1987, he sang a duet with Brigitte Nielsen "Body Next to Body" and the single was a Top 10 hit in the Germanic countries. The Album Wiener Blut was released in 1988 but it did not get much publicity outside Germany and Austria.
In 1990, he made a song for Cindy Crawford and Tatjana Patitz, "Tanja P. not Cindy C.," which appeared on the Album Data de Groove.
After "Jeanny," there were a number of European hits, but Falco was rarely heard in the U.S. and the UK. His 1992 U.S. comeback attempt, the album Nachtflug with the song "Titanic," won a number of awards, but failed to chart in America.

Falco died of severe injuries received from a collision with a bus in his Mitsubishi Pajero near the city of Puerto Plata, in the Dominican Republic on 6 February 1998, just two weeks before his 41st birthday. While it was initially reported that the autopsy showed high blood levels of alcohol and cocaine, this was disputed. At the time of his death, he was working on a comeback into the music world.
He was buried in the Zentralfriedhof (Central Cemetery) in Vienna, Austria.

Song of the Day - Gang of four 6/17/09

Gang of Four - "I Love a Man In Uniform"
# 11 on My Player

Gang of Four are an English post-punk group from Leeds. Original personnel were singer Jon King, guitarist Andy Gill, bass guitarist Dave Allen and drummer Hugo Burnham. They were fully active from 1977 to 1984, and then re-emerged twice in the 1990s with King and Gill. In 2004, the original line-up reunited but in 2006 Allen was replaced on bass by Thomas Mcneice and later Burnham on drums by Mark Heaney.
They play a stripped-down mix of punk rock, with strong elements of funk music, minimalism and dub reggae and an emphasis on the social and political ills in society. Gang of Four's later albums (Songs of the Free and Hard) found them softening some of their more jarring qualities, and drifting towards dance-punk and disco. Their debut album, Entertainment!, ranked at #490 in Rolling Stone's The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. David Fricke in Rolling Stone 1980 said "Gang of Four are probably the best politically motivated dance band

Gill and King, the creative forces in the band, brought together an eclectic array of influences, ranging from the neo-Marxist Frankfurt School of social criticism to the increasingly clear trans-Atlantic punk consensus. Gang of Four was named by a member of the Mekons when while driving around with Gill and King he came upon a newspaper article on the intra-Party coup against China's "Gang of Four".
Their musical work was heavily influenced by a university-funded trip to New York, where they saw Television and the Ramones at CBGB.
Gill's unique guitar sound had a forebear in the playing of Wilko Johnson, the frenetic guitarist with archetypal British pub rockers Dr. Feelgood. Gill's skeletal, staccato, aggressive guitar has proved an enduring influence in turn.[1] Jon King's threatening on-stage dancing, while equally idiosyncratic, has proved less easy to imitate. Paul Morley described the band's music as "a kind of demented funk, incredibly white but also, because of political commitment and defiant sloganeering, very dark, and ultimately as close to the depraved edge of the blues and Hendrix." Critic Greil Marcus found his first viewing of the group's performance so shattering that he left after their set rather than risk having the impact of the deeply political Gang of Four's songs dampened by the pop-punk of Buzzcocks.[2]
The Gang's debut single, "Damaged Goods" backed with "Anthrax" and "Armalite Rifle", was recorded in June 1978 and released on 10 December 1978, on Edinburgh's Fast Product label. It was produced by the Gang and the Fast Product honchos Bob Last and Tim Inman. It was a #1 indie chart hit[citation needed] and John Peel radio show favourite. This led to two outstanding Peel radio sessions, which, with their incendiary live performances, propelled the band to international attention and sold-out shows across Europe and North America. They were then signed by EMI records. The group's debut single with this label, "At Home He's a Tourist", charted in 1979. Invited to appear on top rated BBC music program Top of the Pops, the band walked off the show when the BBC told them that they must sing "packets" instead of "rubbers" as per the lyrics of the song, as the original was too subversive for this TV slot. The single was then banned by BBC Radio and TV, which lost the band support at EMI, who began to push another band, Duran Duran, instead.[citation needed] A later single, "I Love a Man in Uniform", was banned by the BBC during the Falklands War in 1982.
Critic Stewart Mason has called "Anthrax" not only the group's "most notorious song" but also "one of the most unique and interesting songs of its time".[3] It's also a good example of Gang of Four's social perspective: after a minute-long, droning, feedback-laced guitar intro, the rhythm section sets up a funky, churning beat, and the guitar drops out entirely. In one stereo channel, King sings a "post-punk anti-love song",[3] comparing himself to a beetle trapped on its back ("and there's no way for me to get up") and equating love with "a case of anthrax, and that's some thing I don't want to catch." Meanwhile, in the other stereo channel (and slightly less prominent in the mix), Gill reads a deadpan monograph about public perception of love and the prevalence of love songs in popular music: "Love crops up quite a lot as something to sing about, 'cause most groups make most of their songs about falling in love, or how happy they are to be in love, and you occasionally wonder why these groups do sing about it all the time." The simultaneous vocals are rather disorienting, especially when Gill pauses in his examination of love songs to echo a few of King's sung lines.
According to critic Paul Morley, "The Gang spliced the ferocious precision of Dr. Feelgood's working-class blues with the testing avant-garde intrigue of Henry Cow. Wilfully avoiding structural obviousness, melodic prettiness and harmonic corniness, the Gang's music was studded with awkward holes and sharp corners."[citation needed] At the time, the band was recognised as doing something very different to other white guitar acts. Ken Tucker, in Rolling Stone, 1980, wrote: "...rarely have the radical edges of black and white music come closer to overlapping... the Gang of Four utilize their bass guitar every bit as prominently and starkly as the curt bass figures that prod the spoken verses in [Kurtis Blow's "culture defining" huge summer hit] “The Breaks.”
In 1981 the band released their second LP, Solid Gold. Like Entertainment!, the album was uncompromising, spare, and analytical; such songs as "Cheeseburger," "He'd Send in the Army," and "In the Ditch" exposed the paradoxes of warfare, work, and leisure. Van Goss, in a Village Voice review said: "Gang of Four embody a new category in pop, which illuminates all the others, because the motor of their aesthetic is not a 'personal creative vision.'"
A troubled American tour saw the departure of Allen (who later co-founded Shriekback, Low Pop Suicide and The Elastic Purejoy); he was replaced briefly by Busta "Cherry" Jones, a sometime player with Parliament and Talking Heads. He left to work with The Rolling Stones and was replaced by Sara Lee, who was Robert Fripp's bassist in League of Gentlemen. Lee was as good a singer as bassist, and she helped give the band's third studio album, Songs of the Free, a more accessible quality. Although "I Love a Man in Uniform" from the album was the band's most radio-friendly song, it was banned in the UK shortly after its release because Britain was at war in the Falklands Islands. Lee later joined The B-52's to be replaced by Gail Ann Dorsey, later famous for her long time bass playing association with David Bowie. A year later, Burnham left the band after the release of Songs of the Free.
1986 saw the release of The Peel Sessions, a collection of rawly rendered material recorded from 1979 to 1981 for British radio. Melody Maker dubbed the album "a perfect and classic nostalgia trip into the world of gaunt cynicism."
After the release of The Peel Sessions, Gill and King continued Gang of Four releasing Hard in 1983, Mall in 1991 and finally Shrinkwrapped in 1995.
The original lineup of Jon King, Andy Gill, Dave Allen and Hugo Burnham reformed in November 2004. In October 2005, Gang of Four released a new disc featuring new recordings of songs from the albums Entertainment!, Solid Gold and Songs of the Free entitled Return the Gift, along with an album's worth of remixes.
On May 6, 2008, Dave Allen and Burnham left the band, even though Burnham had not played with the band since 2006.[4]
In 2008 Gang of Four headlined - as part of that year's Massive Attack curated "Meltdown festival - London's Royal Festival Hall, with Gail Anne Dorsey on bass rejoining the band alongside Mark Heaney on drums who played drums on Return the Gift in 2005 and had been working with the band since Nov 2005 and later that summer headlined Offset Festival on August 31, 2008.

Like The Velvet Underground before them, the influence of Gang of Four on later musicians is far greater than their original record sales might suggest. Their angular, slashing attack and liberal use of dissonance had a significant influence on their post-punk contemporaries in the States. Gang of Four went on to influence a number of successful funk-tinged alternative rock acts throughout the 80s and 90s, although few of their followers were as arty or political. Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers has stated that Gang of Four were the single most important influence on his band's early music.[5] Andy Kellman, writing in Allmusic, has even argued that Gang of Four's "germs of influence" can be found in many rap metal groups "not in touch with their ancestry enough to realize it".[6]
While many musicians have been inspired by the band's groundbreaking punk-funk musical style, they have rarely emulated the Situationist-inspired socio-political observations in Jon King's lyrics. Nevertheless this side of the band is present in later bands such as Minutemen, Fugazi, Nation of Ulysses, Rage Against the Machine and Refused which while known for acid socio-political commentary in their lyrics as Gang of Four; they took a post-hardcore punk sound. Fugazi especially shares with Gang of Four a sometimes similar sound based on a rhythm section influenced by reggae and funk along with metallic staccato guitars.

Song of the Day - Pop Will Eat Itself 6/16/09

Pop Will Eat Itself - There is no Love Between us Anymore #10 on my Player

In 1986, the line-up of singer and guitarist Clint Mansell, guitarist and keyboardist Adam Mole, bassist Richard March, and drummer Graham Crabb formed as Wild And Wandering in the English town of Stourbridge. After some months and one e.p. they changed their name to Pop Will Eat Itself (PWEI) and earned attention from the indie scene for their first e.p., The Poppies Say Grrr! on Chapter 22. At the time they played short, fast, slightly psychedelic punk-pop tunes and went on with that for three more e.p.'s before starting to incorporate house and hip hop beats and samples on Beaver Patrol. By autumn 1987 PWEI released their frist album, Box Frenzy, with some tunes leaning towards new wave, some towards hip hop and acid house. A drummachine called Dr. Nightmare

was installed and Graham Crabb took

the second microphone. After the 12" Def.Con.One PWEI signed a deal with RCA and released Can U Dig It? in 1989, which would be the first of 12 PWEI singles going UK top 40. In the same year their seminal second album This Is The Day...This Is The Hour...This Is This! appeared to public and critical acclaim for its witty fusion of rock and electronic music. PWEI opted for an even more electronic, slightly darker and moodier approach on Cure For Sanity, their third album, which appeared in 1990 alongside PWEI's alternative soccer world cup theme, Touched By The Hand Of Cicciolina, a fusion of dub and acid house. Electronics took a backseat on 1992's The Looks Or The Lifestyle, when Fuzz Townshend was brought in as a drummer. PWEI reinvented themselves as grungey groovers and released Get The Girl! Kill The Baddies! as their highlight single. PWEI had been sacked by RCA at the time the single went number 9 in the UK in early 1993. The band signed with Infectious in the UK and Nothing in the US and released R.S.V.P., Ich Bin Ein Auslander, and Everything's Cool as singles in 1993 and 1994. The tunes displayed a development from where they had left towards dark industrial rock. The mixture on their fifth album Dos Dedos Mis Amigos was received well and won the band many new fans. Nonetheless, the band only released the remix album Two Fingers My Friends after that and collapsed upon the departure of Graham Crabb in 1996. Crabb released an album as Golden Claw Musics, Richard March went on to form Bentley Rhythm Ace, Fuzz Townshend went solo, and Clint Mansell has done film soundtracks. In late 2004, a reunion and new songs were announced.

This is a catchy tune so listen to the whole thing. See ya!!

Brad

Song of the Day - The Toyes 6/15/09

The Toyes "Smoke two Joints" #9 on my Player Today


The Toyes are an American reggae band based in Grants Pass, Oregon. Their style has been described as a "cross between Bob Marley and Barenaked Ladies." They are perhaps most famous as the original songwriters and recorders of the song "Smoke Two Joints."It was originally recorded in 1983, and was re-released on their 1993 debut album The Toyes. An influential version was recorded by the band Sublime; the song has since been mistakenly attributed to them or to Bob Marley. The Toyes also wrote and performed a song called "Monster Hash", a parody of Bobby "Boris" Pickett's "Monster Mash".
The Toyes are composed of Mawg on Lead Vocals and Lead Guitar, B-dub on Vocals and Rhythm Guitar, John Trujillo on Vocals and Bass Guitar and Brian Rogers on Drums.

(Jean-Christophe Kay) and his brother Sky (Michael Kay) were living together in Waikiki. Sky was working as a Pedi cab driver and Mawg was guitarist and vocalist in the Honolulu-based cover band, The Lifters.
In fall of 1982, Mawg and Sky were entertaining friends who had arrived at the home to take in the finest local herb. While jamming a rootsy groove and improvising lyrics, the hook of “Smoke Two Joints” came tumbling out to the delight of the party guests.
Seeing the response, Mawg and Sky completed the lyrics the following day while sitting under a large banyan tree on Kuhio Beach. Weeks later, Mawg performed the completed “Smoke Two Joints” with The Lifters. According to Mawg, “The crowd went wild and sang along. We played it 5 times that night after the crowd stopped our other songs in mid-performance by chanting 'Smoke Two Joints.'" The tune had become an instant sensation.
Financed by their mother Paulette Kay, a French woman living in France, the Kay brothers immediately recorded the song and produced 500 45 RPM Vinyl discs. Joining them in the studio and rounding out the trio was 17 year-old Ricci Accardi, a local drummer. Having quit The Lifters, Mawg, Sky and Ricci joined up with singer Mike Dawson to form Tightrope, which they later renamed The Toys.
In late 1983 The Toys received a Cease and Desist letter from Motown Records' legal department threatening a lawsuit over the use of the name "The Toys", who were a signed act of Motown and who recorded "A Lover's Concerto". Wanting to avoid costly litigation with the recording giant, the brothers decided to add an "e" to their name, becoming The Toyes.

"Smoke Two Joints" Success
On December 2, 1982, Mawg, Sky and Ricci went into modest Audio-Media Studios in downtown Honolulu to record “Smoke Two Joints” and a hastily made-up jam song, “Big Fat Mama”.
The sessions were produced by Mawg and Sky and engineered by the house recording engineer at Audio-Media, Ed Roy. The songs were recorded and mixed that same day, and the master was quickly sent to a vinyl pressing plant on the mainland Hawaii.
Mawg distributed the 45's at clothing stores, gift shops and convenience stores, as well as making the record available for sale at their live shows.
The record soon found its way into the hands of Andy Preston, the Music Director at 98 Rock KPOI-FM, Oahu’s top rock station and was featured in the station’s 5:00 PM feature “Top 5 at 5”. That month “Smoke Two Joints” usurped Michael Jackson and Journey as the #1 most requested song and held that position for ten months.

The Toyes followed up their 45 RPM single by recording three more songs which were released as a 12" vinyl EP featuring "Smoke Two Joints", "Listen to the Radio", which was released as a second single and received moderate air play in Hawaii, "Never Wanna Go", which is the only Toyes track sung by Mike Dawson, as well as Mawg's solo acoustic guitar composition "Eddie's Theme".
The Toyes went on the road to support the new album touring the Hawaiian Islands and Guam.

Song of the Day - Visage 6/14/09

Visage "Fade to Grey" (12" mix) Track #4 on my Player

Founder members Steve Strange and Rusty Egan were hosting club nights at Blitz nightclub in Great Queen Street, London at the time and were eager to find new music to play, ultimately opting to create music themselves. Strange commented about the meaning of the band's name: "The meaning of Visage, apart from being French for face, is that the Vis is for the visual side of the band... and the Age is the new age in dance music. That's how I see it." [1]
Initially, the band was composed of Strange, Egan and Midge Ure. Ure and Egan began working with Strange during their last days with band The Rich Kids, with Strange himself being at a loose end after leaving the new wave band The Photons. The trio recorded a demo which included a cover of the Zager and Evans hit "In the Year 2525". Ultravox's multi-instrumentalist Billy Currie and the core of post-punk band Magazine – guitarist John McGeoch and keyboardist Dave Formula – joined the studio-only band later (Magazine's bassist Barry Adamson also played a minor role in the recording sessions though was not officially listed as a band member on any of Visage's record releases[2]). Visage signed to Radar Records and released their first single, "Tar", in September 1979. The single failed to chart, but the band managed to secure a deal with a larger record company (Polydor) the following year.

1980 saw the release of their second single, "Fade to Grey". The single became a huge hit (making the top ten in the UK and topping the chart in several other countries) and was quickly followed by the release of their self-titled debut album which was also a chart success.
After further Top 40 hits with "Mind of a Toy" and the title track "Visage", Strange struggled to reunite the band's members again to record a second album because of their commitments with their respective bands (Ure and Currie with Ultravox, Formula with Magazine, and McGeoch with Siouxsie and the Banshees). However, in the autumn of 1981 all musicians (except McGeoch) went into the studio again and recorded The Anvil. The album was released in March 1982 and became Visage's first (and only) UK top ten album, producing two top twenty singles with "The Damned Don't Cry" and "Night Train". The Anvil earned a Silver disc in the UK, as did the band's first album.
Following this, Ure left the band to concentrate on his work with Ultravox, who were by now becoming even more successful than Visage were. Creative differences with Strange were also cited as reasons for his departure at the time. Visage, now without Ure and Adamson (who continued collaborating with Pete Shelley, and joined The Birthday Party) but with the addition of bassist Steve Barnacle, recorded the stand-alone single "Pleasure Boys", which was released in October 1982. Unfortunately, the single failed to prolongue their string of hits and peaked just outside the UK top 40.

Athough still recording, Visage then took a two year hiatus from releasing any new material due to contractual difficulties. Polydor issued a "best of" compilation in 1983; Fade to Grey - The Singles Collection which included all of the singles released to date and the previously unreleased "In The Year 2525". Limited quantities of the album were issued with a free "Pleasure Boys" 7" picture disc single, whereas the cassette version of the album featured remixes of the singles. Although it only just peaked inside the UK top 40, the album was certified Gold in the UK shortly after its release.
With their contractual problems resolved, 1984 saw the return of Visage for what would become their third and final album to date. Beat Boy was released in September 1984 but was a critical and commercial failure, peaking at #79 in the UK. Two singles from the album; "Love Glove" and "Beat Boy" also failed to make the UK top 40. By this time, Billy Currie and Dave Formula had also departed the band (though they received a "special thanks" credit on the album sleeve for their input), leaving only Strange and Egan from the original line-up along with newer musicians Steve & Gary Barnacle and Andy Barnett. A decision to make Visage a live band instead of a strictly studio-based project also failed to meet with success and the band subsequently split in 1985. Their final release was a Visage VHS video compilation of the band's renowned promotional videos and also included footage of Strange's trip to North Africa the year before. The compilation does not, however, include the original video for the "Love Glove" single which was filmed at a late-night Dockland location in London in 1984.

Following the demise of Visage, Strange then formed the short-lived band Strange Cruise. They were signed to EMI and released two singles; these being "Rebel Blue Rocker" and a cover version of Sonny and Cher's "And The Beat Goes On". Neither of these singles made the charts. The band also released one album in 1986, though this too proved unsuccessful. Visage returned to the charts once more when a Bassheads remix of "Fade to Grey" was a UK Top 40 hit in 1993.

Second incarnation (2004-)
Steve Strange reappeared on the music scene in 2002, after several years of battling a heroin addiction. Strange performed several Visage songs on the "Here and Now Xmas Tour" — a revival of 1980s musicians. Some time after the performance, noting he still had a fanbase, Strange decided to launch what he calls a "Mark II" of Visage with people from several electronic bands and projects: Steven Young, Sandrine Gouriou and Rosie Harris from Seize and Ross Tregenza from Jetstream Lovers/Goteki. After the announcement of the formation of the new line-up and several television appearances, plans for reworking old material and releasing a new record have made slow progress. An updated version of Fade To Grey was produced in 2005 and Strange recorded the first "Visage mark II" original composition, named "In the Dark", as part of electronic music duo Punx Soundcheck's debut double album When Machines Ruled the World. The album was released in Europe in Summer 2006.
In 2007, another new song entitled "Diary Of A Madman" was recorded. Written by Strange with Visage mk II member Ross Tregenza, the track was co-produced by original Visage member Dave Formula [3]. This song was made available for download from their official website in return for a donation to the charity Children in Need.
The long-since deleted Visage VHS video collection was repackaged for release on DVD in Summer 2006, though it was mistakenly titled "Visage Live".
In 2008, Strange (and Visage II keyboardist Sandrine Gouriou) made an appearance in the BBC series Ashes to Ashes which is set in 1981. In it, they performed the song Fade to Grey in a scene set in the "Blitz" nightclub.
In 2009, Strange and Egan appeared in Living's 'Pop Goes the Band' [4], a series in which pop stars from the 80s are given a complete makeover in return for a one-off performance. The Visage episode aired on on 16 March 2009, and was the first time that the two men had spoken in over 20 years. The episode focussed (like others in the series) more on getting them fit in the gym than on the current state of their relationship, though they appeared to get on well enough. At the culmination of the episode, they performed Fade to Grey.

Song of the Day - The Smitheeens 6/13/09

Babjak, Diken and Mesaros are all from Carteret, New Jersey and had graduated in 1975 from Carteret High School. The three joined together to form the band in 1980 with DiNizio, who is from Scotch Plains, New Jersey.[2]
The Smithereens are known for writing and playing catchy 1960s-influenced power pop. The group gained some publicity when a single from its first album, "Blood and Roses", was included on the soundtrack for, and as the theme song of the 1986 Albert Pyun movie, Dangerously Close, and the video got some moderately heavy rotation on MTV. The group spent some time in its initial semi-celebrity phase defending itself in Rolling Stone against thinly-veiled accusations of sounding too much like The Byrds and The Beatles, pointing out that its Marshall Amplifier-heavy live sound was closer to heavy metal than it was to The Beatles. The Smithereens have always worn their inspirations proudly, but the band also influenced other musicians, most notably Kurt Cobain during the period he was writing Nevermind. Ironically, some feel the Smithereens (like many early 1990s bands) were hurt by the rise of grunge music.
Along with a basic Eastern-coast roots-rock sound that owed much to the inspirations of DiNizio, including Buddy Holly, The Who, The Clash, Elvis Costello, and Nick Lowe, the Smithereens deployed a uniquely retro obsession with Mod, the late British Invasion pop of John's Children and The Move, and other artifacts of fifties and sixties culture that lent its music substance. The title and lyrics of their song, "In a Lonely Place," appear to be based on the 1950 Humphrey Bogart film of the same name, including the lyrics, "I was born the day I met you, lived a while when you loved me, died a little when we broke apart." The title and artwork for the album 11 were a nod to the original 1960 Ocean's Eleven film.
The Smithereens featured as the entertainment in the indoor beach party scene of the Troma film Class of Nuke 'Em High, playing the song "Much Too Much".
The highest position a Smithereens album attained on the Billboard pop charts was in 1990, when 11 peaked at #41 on the strength of the single "A Girl Like You" (which hit #38). "A Girl Like You" was originally written to be the title track for the 1989 Cameron Crowe film Say Anything.
The Smithereens have collaborated with numerous musicians, both in the studio (Suzanne Vega and Belinda Carlisle) and live (Graham Parker and The Kinks).
The group, which has long had a reputation for playing excellent live shows, is still active and tours frequently. Their next studio album is expected to be released in fall 2009.




Beauty & Sadness
Strangers When We Meet
Blood & Roses
In A Lonely Place
Behind The Wall Of Sleep
Only A Memory
House We Used To Live In
Drown In My Own Tears
A Girl Like You
Blue Period
Blues Before & After
Yesterday Girl
Top Of The Pops
Too Much Passion
Miles From Nowhere
Time Won't Let Me






Behind the Wall of Sleep is in the #2 position on my Player at the bottom of the page ~~ Brad

Song of the Day - Robert Hazard 6/12/09

This next one is a great one from the mid 80's - From a guy named Robert Hazard. You could call this a "One Hit Wonder", as he really had no other song that got much play on the radio. Thia one is called "Escalator of Life" and it really is a good one. This song is in the #1 position on my Player at the bottom of the page so you can listen to it. Have fun~~

Brad

Tracklisting:
A1
Escalator Of Life
Remix - Neil Kernon
A2
Change Reaction
Remix - Neil Kernon
B1
(I Just Want To) Hang Around With You
B2
Out Of The Blue
Remix - Neil Kernon
B3
Blowin' In The Wind
Written-By - Bob Dylan