Easy 99.1 Brings the Schmaltz

Over the weekend I was once again happily within the listening area of Easy 99.1 WPLM, "The Resting Place of the Schmaltz". And it did not disappoint, with a bumper crop of easy hits I hadn't heard in far too long.

And Rhapsody, it's not that I ain't grateful for you getting tracks in from Jim Croce and Harry Chapin over the last year, but they're very lonely in there without Gordon Lightfoot's finer offerings. Just a little something to work on in 2007.

Easy 99.1 Brings the Schmaltz

Slow Hand - the Pointer Sisters
We'll Never Have To Say Goodbye Again - England Dan Ford & John Ford Coley
Fooled Around And Fell In Love - Elvin Bishop

Saint Coltrane Ballads Brings Thee A Healing

Schmaltzy Junior is home with a fever and cough today. And one thing we discovered very early together is the unmatched soothing power of John Coltrane's Ballads album. In this day of multiple-resistant bacteria, the bug hasn't been born that doesn't melt before the sound of the good Saint John. This playlist just links to the whole album.

Saint Coltrane Ballads Brings Thee A Healing

Say It (Over And Over Again)
You Don't Know What Love Is
Too Young To Go Steady
All Or Nothing At All
I Wish I Knew
What's New
It's Easy To Remember
Nancy (With The Laughing Face)

Fallow Forage Fresh Catch Playlist

Today, a fresh catch forage from the fields going fallow over on the schmaltzy side of the street.

Fallow Forage Fresh Catch Playlist

The Wave - Merv Griffin
A Nightingale Sang In Berkeley Square - Anita O'Day
Ma Pomme - Maurice Chevalier
Send In The Clowns - Milt Jackson

Good News

No sooner do I speak up and complain about the deletion of MC Paul Barman than Paullelujah! comes back into Rhapsody. I swear it was deleted for at least these painful 13 months or so.

"Was I to rap as France was to Morocco? Was I:rap::France:Morocco?"

May the return of the Frank Zappa catalog take half as much whining...

And MC Paul B, please give DJ Anna a call. She knows what she's doing, and she makes the Northeast boys swoon. And we're overdue to see you both...

Paullelujah! It's Back. Eurekah!

Cock Mobster
Burping & Farting
Old Paul
Anarchist Bookstore

Out To Lunch Friday Playlist

Today it's out to lunch with some feel-good instrumental stylings. Well, there's one song with words but only four or five, and we'll allow it since it's a fine rendition of an Angelo Badalamenti song from Twin Peaks.

On an interesting background note, the Routers were an early sixties instrumental combination anchored by the legendary studio "Wrecking Crew" of Leon Russell, Hal Blaine, and Tommy Tedesco. Four of their albums have slipped into Rhapsody over the last few months.

Out To Lunch Friday Playlist

Soulful Strut - The Young-Holt Unlimited
Watermelon Man - The Routers
Just You And I - The Autumns
Big Trak Attack - Man Or Astro-Man?
Ghardaia Dub - Prince Far I and the Arabs

Freddy Fender Retrospecticus Playlist

Freddy Fender left this plane on Saturday, sixty nine years after taking on human form. He had a long, turbulent, and repeatedly quite successful career as a musician.

I've been fascinated by Freddy Fender since I was in elementary school and he came to play in a nearby high school gym. I figured that anybody who looked alot like a muppet (on that album cover up there) and played in the same place I went to see the Harlem Globetrotters, well he must be pretty cool.

Most of the stages of his career are well-represented in Rhapsody. In this retrospecticus playlist we get his early Spanish interpretations of rock hits, his Americas-wide own smash hits, and his mature (but no less spirited) work as an elder statesman of Texas music.

Freddy Fender Retrospecticus Playlist

Vamos A Bailar
Bailando El Rock and Roll
Mi Destino Fue Quererte
No Estes Sonando
Viejos Amigos
Dime Si Me Vas A Ver
Before The Next Teardrop Falls
Wasted Days And Wasted Nights
Vaya Con Dios
Who Were You Thinkin' Of - as one of the Texas Tornados
Arretirate A Los Campos - with Flaco Jimenez
Adios Muchachos

Scattered Winds Fresh Catch Tuesday Playlist

A cool, damp playlist of songs scattering around the car with the low mist and fallen leaves turbulating down the road on a dim Tuesday morning.

Scattered Winds Fresh Catch Tuesday Playlist

The Things We Do For Love - 10cc
Never My Love - The Association
Hearts - Marty Balin
Rock The Boat - Hues Corporation
We Gotta Get You A Woman - Todd Rundgren

Out To Lunch Friday Playlist

Today out to lunch, I think I'm actually going to go out to lunch. Here's a fine Friday playlist to celebrate the situation. There's an emphasis on songs recently added to Rhapsody, as is our custom. Today in particular we note the additions of the first recorded music by the Marley children, we welcome Quasi's Sword Of God to Rhapsody, and we bob our heads uncontrollably for over eleven minutes with organ great Charles Earland.

Out To Lunch Friday Playlist

Drop It In The Slot - Tower Of Power
Genetic Science - Quasi
Oh Sherrie - Steve Perry
Sugar Pie - Melody Makers
I Don't Know Why (I Just Do) - Joe Williams
More Today Than Yesterday - Charles Earland

(a) Senile Animal Sampler Playlist

It's no secret that if my first born had been a boy we would have named him Dale Crover Shifty. So you can imagine I had some questions when I read that the Melvins added a second drummer for (a) Senile Animal, released Tuesday to the world and Rhapsody. Does he need the help? Will it sound as superfluous and silly as the second drum set employed by the likes of the Allman Brothers?

After a day soaking the album up I'm happy to report that my worries have been dissolved and washed out my chutes. In addition to the welcome rhythmic dimension added by the drumming of Coady Willis, Jared Warren adds some new vocal layers to the Melvins recipe. Fine stuff. Misters Willis and Warren come together directly from Big Business, and separately indirectly from Karp and the Murder City Devils before that.

I'm off to scare up a recording from the current tour to see how the new bits get applied to older songs.

For today's sampler, a two song sequence from the heart of the matter.

(a) Senile Animal Sampler Playlist

The Hawk
You've Never Been Right

Mano A Mano Ribaldry Friday Playlist

With the current political and journalistic uproar in the USA, I think we as a nation are losing sight of the lighter side of man-on-man ribaldry. Today we at R&S try to return that focus with a playlist featuring those great Americans, Pansy Division.

Mano A Mano Ribaldry Friday Playlist

Groovy Underwear
James Bondage
Alpine Skiing
He Whipped My Ass at Tennis

Addendum: Speaking of femmes in a black tuxedo, here's another fine bit of youtubery featuring Ribaldry and Schmaltz poster boy Bobby Short, singing the Charlie perfume theme song.

Flying South Thursday Playlist

This week my eardrums have been migrating south with the rest of the smarter species.

I heard a snippet of something on the radio over the weekend that put the chorus to 'Take Me Back To Tulsa' in my head. And it's been there on auto-repeat ever since. Inexplicably, the only thing that's knocked it loose is this verse from 'Pick Up The Tempo' by Willie Nelson. It's no literary juggernaut, but it's quietly expanding in my imagination:

"Well I'm wild and I'm mean, I'm creating a scene
And I'm going crazy,

I'm good and I'm bad, and I'm happy and I'm sad
And I'm lazy,

I'm quiet and I'm loud and I'm gathering a crowd
And I like gravy,

I'm about half off the wall, but I learned it all in the Navy."

To round things out, some similar creatures: a live Willie version of Truck Drivin' Man that starts right out with some tasty alternate lyrics, some recently added guit-steel love from Junior Brown and Cajun fiddle love from Dennis McGee, and a very odd bird of a new release: Chris Difford giving an acoustical countrified treatment to selections from the Squeeze catalog (a promising concept that lacks a certain fire in its execution).

Flying South Thursday Playlist

Take Me Back To Tulsa - Hazel and Alice
Truck Drivin' Man - Willie Nelson
Phases and Stages (Theme)/Pick Up The Tempo - Willie Nelson
Another Nail In My Heart - Chris Difford
Hillbilly Hula Gal - Junior Brown
One Step De Mamou - Dennis McGee