“Vanish” – Blueburst with Marty Willson-Piper
The story behind this song is one of the cooler ones I’ve come across this year. Craig Douglas Miller was in a band in the Nineties that got some major label attention during the great Alternative Rock Revolution but was never signed nor had any real success. Miller eventually retreated from the music world due to a variety of factors, most related to some severe mental health issues. Decades later he struck up a friendship with Marty Willson-Piper, a one-time member of the legendary band The Church. Willson-Piper convinced Miller to start writing and recording songs again, helping him put together a debut album at the age of 50. This was the first single. It is a terrific piece of timeless rock music.
“All My Friends” – Queen of Jeans
Gorgeous, gorgeous song.
“Lights on the Way” – Rose City Band
Some good, Seventies-like country-rock fusion music. Ripley Johnson said the whole point of this band is to make uplifting, good time music. We need that today, Sir.
“New Rules” – Blankenberge
Shoegaze from Russia? Who knew their dictator let that genre cross his borders?
“There And Back Again” – Humdrum
This band is from Chicago. But there’s an awful lot of mid-80s-through-mid-90s England in their sound.
“Yoke” – Medium Build with Julien Baker
From a vibes perspective, this fits the season, as we have finally slipped into the dreary and chilly part of the year.
“Chase Your Demons Out” – Good Looks
After dropping a terrific album this summer, Good Looks is already releasing new music. This time a double-sided single that features two great songs. I flipped a coin and picked this one to share.
“Run to You” – Bryan Adams
Breaking form a little this week, as there were no high quality debuts on this week’s 1984 countdown and the following week had multiple options. So we jump ahead to the week of November 24. That was a big week. Doug Flutie threw his most famous pass that weekend. We spent the entire week at my grandparents’, my mom needing an extra-long holiday before she underwent her second major surgery of the year a few weeks later. One of my dad’s brothers hitched a ride with us to his parents and he brought along Hall and Oates’ new cassette, that we listened to many, many times.
There were three massive debuts in the Top 40 that week. We’ll get to the biggest but this week we celebrate my favorite Bryan Adams song. A year later, around Christmas 1985, I daydreamed of learning how to play the acoustic solo in the middle, and serenading a very cute girl in my English class with it. A year or so later I learned this girl was super religious and probably wouldn’t have been all that impressed by me singing a song about the joys of infidelity to her. And you wonder why I didn’t have much success with the ladies…