Friday Playlist

“PUNK ROCKY” – ASAP Rocky
One of many successful hip hop artists I knew the name of but was not familiar with their work. At least until I heard this terrific track on The Bridge a couple weeks ago.

“C.L.U.T.T.E.R.” – Clutter
Joining bands like Bad Company, Black Sabbath, Talk Talk, Bad Religion, and Living In A Box, among others, that have songs with the same name as the group.

“Dancing On The Wall” – MUNA
OH SHIT! NEW MUNA JUST DROPPED!

“Twisted On A Train” – King Tuff
Kyle Thomas’ new album is called Moo and he describes it as a back to rock basics effort. I can get down with all of that.

“Twisters” – Brown Horse
For obvious reasons this song gets slotted in next. Very solid twang-rock from the UK of all places.

“NEVER BEEN BETTER” – VIAL
“Burn It Down” – Ratboys
I put these two songs together because VIAL is from Minneapolis and has been very outspoken about the authoritarian military attack on their home city over the past month, while Ratboys wrote “Burn It Down” after the murder of George Floyd but saved it for their newest album. What a disaster our nation has become, and all because a geriatric with the emotional maturity of a toddler got his feelings hurt when the nation voted against him.

“Fading Out” – Primitive Radio Gods
This week’s Alternative Numbers Ones entry was about PRG’s “Standing Outside a Broken Phone Booth with Money in My Hand.” In the piece Tom Breihan referred to PRG as a One Hit Wonder and got into that a bit, noting how it’s not necessarily a bad label. While it is mostly correct to slot this band that way, this track did get a decent amount of airplay on alternative radio in 2000, just not enough to chart, I guess. I always liked it more than their big hit.

“Hazy Shade Of Winter” – The Bangles covering Simon & Garfunkle
’Tis the season to share one of the greatest covers ever recorded. Thankfully winter has become a little hazy around here, and looks to remain hazy for at least a week. The last of our snowbanks should be gone by the end of the weekend.

“Stuck Between Stations” – The Hold Steady
This year is the 20th anniversary of THS’ greatest album, Boys And Girls In America. To celebrate the band is doing a series of dates in Chicago, Boston, Portland, Seattle, and New York, stretched out over most of the second half of the year. Tuesday morning I obtained tickets for myself and a couple brothers in music to the big Chicago show. I am pretty geeked about it. You will hear more about that as we get closer.

“When Doves Cry” – Prince & The Revolution
Finally, I just stumbled across this amazing piece of history, Prince and his band rehearsing one of his biggest hits.