Mid-February

This week's selections, while few, are a hilarious sampling of what I was into about 10 years ago. I promise, I was not a pothead. My musical taste was, though.

22. Rusted Root - When I Woke

Here is my Rusted Root story:

"You wanna go with me to Memphis in May and see Rusted Root tonight?" "Heck yeah!" - this is a conversation I had about 12 or 13 years ago. I wish I still had convos like that now, and the fun that usually comes soon after.

I think it was just before summer break in 1999, the end of my first year at Mississippi College (not exactly a party school, but we still found ways to have fun - usually involving getting as far away from campus as possible). I had become pretty good friends with this cool girl named Sally. She was very free-spirited and a lot of fun. She had an extra ticket to Memphis in May*. Seeing as school was out and my birthday was just around the corner, I needed a fun trip to celebrate.

The plan was to drive up, meet up with some friends of hers at the show, and drive back that same night. Memphis is "only" 3 hours away, so it was doable. We got there in the early afternoon and stopped off at the home of a friend of Sally's before heading downtown. After visiting with them for a while, we drove down near Beale and somehow found a place to park. I remember we managed to get something to eat at Blues City cafe, and then made our way down to Tom Lee park. This was my first visit to the festival and it was an awesome people-watching spectacle. LOADS of hippies, baby hipsters and frat boys all around. There were lots of vendors set up selling jewelry, "water pipes," you name it. I guess we eventually found her friends and settled in for some Rusted Root. We probably saw some other acts before they came on, but I don't remember now. I had not been super familiar with RR's music before this show, but it was still fun.

We headed back to Jackson pretty late, probably around 11:00 or midnight. Sally drove a blue Pontiac 6000, which, coincidentally, was exactly the same kind of car I had in high school. It was 1999, so I am not sure I even had a cell phone, and if I did, it wasn't with me. Sally had a bag phone, I think. The Pontiac 6000, while it was a nice car for a young student to drive, was lacking in one particular feature: it had no warning light for the gas gauge.

Sally and I are talking and laughing, listening to Edie Brickell and trying not to fall asleep, and we're getting closer to Clinton. Suddenly, the 6000 starts sputtering, and slowing down. We are now wide awake. She looks down at the dashboard and realizes that we have run out of gas. No big deal, it's only 2:00 in the morning and we're on I-220 near the Medgar Evers exit. Just two 21-year old gals! Totally safe.

We think for a minute about walking to the gas station that's just off the exit ramp on Medgar Evers, but knowing the area and the time of night, we decide against it. She pulls out the bag phone and we try to think about who to call. Remember, this is the end of the school year. School was out, actually. Sally was from the coast, and the only reason she was still in town was because she was an RA, and they had to stay an extra day or two for some reason. I don't know why I was still around. Probably just for this trip. Anyway, the point is, there was nobody left in the dorms to call. Except for our friend Carol, who also happened to be the Resident Director of our dorm. Carol was and is a very sweet person; so sweet in fact that we really hated to call and wake her up like that. But this was a pretty desperate situation, so we called her. About 20 minutes later, she and another friend and her boyfriend come to help us. I'm sure they all thought we had lost our minds, but they were nice enough not to make us feel worse about it. We got some gas, made it back to the dorm, and crashed out for probably 12 hours or so.

Was it worth it? Totally. Would I do that again? Probably not.

Rusted Root put on a good show if I remember correctly, but I never became a superfan. Maybe if I had been a pothead? Their music is just a little too earthy/bongo-y for me now. But I always smile when I think about that trip.

*Later, when I lived in Memphis, I learned that it is actually called "Beale Street Music Festival," but nobody down here really calls it that. (Memphis in May actually encompasses the entire month of May, because there are different festivals going on every weekend, but I'm showing my snobbery as a former Memphian and digressing. Sorry!)


23. Mix CD from 2001 or Thereabouts

So there will be several of these throughout this project. Like a lot of music nerds, I used to make tons of mixtapes. When tapes finally went out, and I got a CD burner**, it became mix CDs. Most of them I only made for myself to listen to in the car, but of course some of them I made for friends or cute boys. I always made copies of the ones I made for cute boys.

I am pretty sure this is a copy of one I made for a guy I was seeing off and on in Memphis. It was a very silly relationship that I wasted a lot of time on. But of course at the time I just knew we were meant to be, and this mixtape was going to propel us forward into the throes of mutual "like."

The disc begins with Phish's "Theme from the Bottom," a deliciously pathetic tune. I don't think I could've been more obvious. There's some obscure Dave Matthews, some Ben Harper, Ani DiFranco, Jeff Buckley, and even (cringe) some Jack Johnson. In my defense, he was just becoming popular at the time. I had no idea all his songs would wind up sounding exactly the same.

I don't know what I was thinking giving this guy a CD like this. Overall it has a very dark and dreary feel. I guess I wanted him to think I was deep? But really, I think I just looked extremely desperate/borderline psycho. Jeff Buckley singing "I know we could be so happy baby/if we wanted to be"? Poor Jeff, who had just died a few years earlier in Memphis, had to have been rolling in his grave, telling me to stop.

I will say that one line from Ben Harper's "Show Me a Little Shame" still sticks out and sums up the way my relationship was with this guy to a T. "You change your mind so many times/I wonder if you have a mind at all/And I'd rather be by myself/than to have your lonesome company come to call." I do think I put that one on there on purpose.

**I still recall going to Best Buy to purchase a CD burner and installing it myself in my tower hard drive. Still proud that I could do something like that, but WTF, really? I bet I paid nearly $100 for that thing.

When I think about my college/grad school years in the late '90s/early '00s, it often seems like it was really just a year or two ago. But then... bag phones? Pontiacs with no gas warning lights? installing a CD burner into a desktop computer that takes up half your living room? 3-day passes to Memphis in May were $36 in 1999. They are $65 today. Pontiacs don't exist anymore. My work computer doesn't even have a CD drive in it at all. So... ok, I'll concede. It's been a long time! But how fun it is to look back and see how far we have come.

Late January/Early Feb

I guess I'm a little behind so I can't exactly go by weeks anymore. But I have good reasons! I've been really busy with work and "extra-curriculars" - things like my niece's birthday, the Best of Jackson party, training for my next half-marathon, etcetera, etcetera.

Also, if you notice, I've re-numbered the discs. Thinking about just how many CDs I have, I thought it would be better if I numbered sequentially rather than starting over each post. This way, by the end of the project, I'll know exactly how many of these damn things I actually own and have listened to!

I took a trip to Greenwood, MS, for work a week or so ago, and seeing as that is a 2-hour trip one way, I got through several CDs that day. It's nice to have so much to listen to when I'm on the road. When I rent cars, I usually have Ipod capabilities, so I'll plug in my phone and enjoy Pandora or Radio Paradise. Since Greenwood is a relatively short trip, I took my own car and looked at it as a good excuse to burn through some of these albums.

One quick aside before I begin my reviews: recently Jackson lost two of its pop/rock radio stations to a format change. Normally I can live with these changes - many times the formats don't change drastically, or if they do, there's still at least one other station in town that plays similar music. But this format change was a huge blow to the Jackson radio scene. 94.7, most recently known as Jack FM, and 93.9 (or Rock 93.9) were both taken over by satellite radio stations. But it wasn't just any station; friends, it was K-Love. And while I am a Christian and I think Christian music has its place, taking over two more radio stations (we already had 2 other contemporary Christian stations and one gospel station) is a bit much. I won't take the time to delineate all of my feelings about contemporary Christian music here. But I will say that I have a problem with K-Love taking over these stations, especially 94.7. First, 94.7 was pretty family-friendly to begin with. They played mostly 80s and 90s pop, with the occasional current song thrown in, but mostly just songs that people in the 18-44 age group grew up with. Now there are no stations that play this format. Secondly, K-Love is not local. The few staff that were working at the little station on Beasley Road were probably replaced by a computer. This means no more live remotes, no more support for community events and promotion by the radio station - in fact, no community participation at all. Also, K-Love runs solely on donations, so when listeners donate money it goes to Colorado, rather than staying in Mississippi. I have a problem with that.

So, when these stations changed format a few weeks ago, I quickly changed my presets in the car and thanked God for giving me a love for all kinds of music and the ability to acquire hundreds of CDs.

14. Counting Crows - August & Everything After
It was a rainy day when I popped this album in, and that seemed to be a perfect fit. I still really like this CD after all these years. But I got to wondering what happened to this and many other bands/artists that you will find on my list. I recall Counting Crows doing some stuff in the early 2000s, but where are they now? Does Adam Duritz still have those crazy dreads?

According to Wikipedia , the band just released a live version of "August & Everything After," and they are planning to release a covers album this year. And yes, he does still have the hair. And apparently Mike & the Mechanics were an early influence?! Now all that makes me think of is last week's Portlandia.

15. Oxford American 2007 Music Sampler

There will be several of these over time that I will listen to. I began reading the Oxford American and getting the music issue especially shortly after the magazine began in the late '90s, then located actually in Oxford, MS. My cousin Jessi worked there as a fact-checker and would send me the music issues I missed before I got turned on to the mag. Those early discs were real gems. There had been nothing quite like it before. Paste followed a similar route with its CD samplers later, but those were always new artists. The great thing about the OA is that each disc was a schooling on Southern music history, while subtly introducing you to some new Southern acts as well. This particular disc starts out with the classic "If I Were a Carpenter" by Eldridge Holmes and continues on to feature legends such as Thelonious Monk and Van Dyke Parks, but also slyly intermingling current acts like David Banner and Iris Dement (although she really belongs in another century). I popped this disc in just as the Yazoo hills gave way to the flat Delta soil, so it was a perfect soundtrack.

16. Bob Wills and the Texas Playboys

I think this is a "Greatest Hits" album, maybe. I copied it from my boyfriend, a Texan himself. I had never heard of Bob Wills before I met the BF, but I had definitely heard this style of music. Think Hank Williams, only a little more upbeat. Something made me think that Bob had a drinking problem back in his day - maybe the BF had told me about this, so I looked him up and the Wikipedias say that he was a binge drinker, which did affect his ability to perform. But I don't think he was an alcoholic, necessarily. His style of music was early honky-tonk, good-time drinking music in the 1950s. So it's no wonder he liked to have a beer or 12! Bob Wills' music is fun and an important part of country music history for sure.

17. Clinic - Walking With Thee

My early foray into internet radio introduced me to Clinic. "The Equalizer" was the song that got my attention, with its sample of "Iko Iko" providing the beat and the trippy lyrics. The rest of the album is kind of meh... it gets annoying after a while. But if you're in the right mood it can be a pretty interesting soundtrack. Continuing my "Where Are They Now?" theme, it seems that Clinic is still around, and their last full-length album came out in 2010.


18. Grand National - Kicking the National Habit

I wore this album out when it first came out in the US in 2006. It actually came out 2 years earlier in the UK, but we had to wait a while. I used to (and still do) listen to Radio Paradise a lot, and it introduced me to a plethora of indie bands in the '00s. Grand National was on heavy rotation in 2005 or so, and I shook my fist at the skies when I realized that I couldn't get the album in the US yet. Maybe I wore it out too much because I haven't listened to it a lot since then. It was fun to give it another spin. It's basically just a fun dance-rock album that leans a little toward annoying at times. The group got its start as a Police cover band, which makes sense if you pay attention to the duo's vocal stylings. As for what they are doing now, apparently, nothing. I couldn't find much beyond 2008. Oh well!

19. Big Star - #1 Record/Radio City

I could go on all day about Big Star. It's really too much to write here. Needless to say, this one stayed in the CD player for several days. I was lucky enough to get to see what became a tribute concert in Memphis in May of 2010, just a couple of months after Alex Chilton died. Jody Stephens was there, and it was a kick-ass show. I just got a vinyl EP from that very show a few weeks ago, and the BF and I have been wearing it out. I was a little late to the bandwagon with Big Star, only discovering them in the early-mid 2000s, but no matter. Now I never go far...


20. The Walkmen - Everyone Who Pretended to Like Me is Gone

The third in this list of discs that fall in the "slightly annoying" category. What's interesting is that I bought the Clinic, Grand National and Walkmen albums in the same year or so. What can I say? I was expanding my horizons. I think The Walkmen are actually a good band. This album has its moments, and yes, I bought it because of "We've Been Had," that catchy song from the Saturn commercial so long ago. But the disc as a whole is just not one that I want to listen to over and over. I hear they did a Nilsson cover album a few years back, and seeing that Nilsson is one of my All Time Top 5 Dead Guys of Rock, I really need to check that out.

21. David Gray - White Ladder

2001. This album takes me straight back to 2001, and grad school, and Memphis, and stupid boys. It had been a really really long time since I had listened to this one, and it was like stepping into a time machine, no joke. I couldn't help but laugh at myself. How I used to crank up the volume on "Say Hello/Wave Goodbye" and CRY and SING at the top of my voice. I didn't even know at the time that it was just a sappy cover of a Soft Cell song. SOFT CELL!

Anyway, I still have a soft spot in my heart for D. Gray. He was a blonde, British Dave Matthews for me. I saw him in Nashville during my time as a Tennessean, and it really was a good show. His cover of Randy Newman's "Baltimore" is still one of my all-time favorites, although not as good as the original. And it's so obvious how much of a Van Morrison fan David Gray is, so naturally I love him for that.

Week 3

Somewhat random mix this past week:

9. Sufjan Stevens - Come on Feel the Illinoise

I'd still like to know when Sufjan is going to get on the next state in his "50 States" series. I don't think it's actually going to happen, but it should. I think he realized he didn't know enough about all 50 states to make this happen. But what a great reason to learn! Come on Sufjan, man up and stick to your promises!

Anyway, this album is really really good, even 7 years later. I forgot what a beautifully creepy song "John Wayne Gacy" is. This album isn't exactly a feel-good experience from beginning to end, but it does have its moments.

10. The Best of Badfinger

Badfinger reminds me of the early days in my relationship with the BF. We both really dig this band and the first several songs were in heavy rotation for a while at our house. Badfinger was formed as somewhat of a Beatles spinoff, but I think that they really did hold their own. At times their sound reminds me of Big Star too, which is always a good thing.


11. Best of Crowded House

I don't think that the album cover to the left is actually the one that goes with this CD, but I have long since lost the cover so I really have no clue what it looks like. At any rate, this is a great album. The Finn brothers write some of the best songs around, and after listening to a few "sad bastard" albums lately, it's nice to have some feel-good music to drive to. I let this one start over a few times before I went on to the next CD.




12. Local Natives - Gorilla Manor

I discovered this band one night when flipping channels. They were the musical guest on Craig Ferguson's show, and I think this album had just come out. I rarely enjoy bands on late-night talk shows anymore, but these guys had my attention. I immediately went to Itunes to download the song that they performed on the show. When I sampled the other songs on the album, I realized that there wasn't a bad song in the bunch, so I downloaded the whole thing. That just doesn't happen much these days. Some might say that the harmonies are too cliche' and easy, but I think they feel right and sound awesome. Sometimes music doesn't have to be complicated.


13. Dave Matthews Band - Crash

Ok, I'll admit it. I was a HUGE Dave-head in college. Up until a few years ago when I got my new car, I still had a Firedancer sticker on my back window. Yeah, I know.

I had not listened to any DMB in a long time. I lost interest in the mid-late 2000s because I felt like the latter albums that the band released were just... meh. Not the same music I fell in love with as a 20-something. Going back to the music now, I have to say that a lot of it doesn't have the staying power that I once thought it would. Maybe I'm stuffier and older now, but some of the lyrics are just bad. "I have no lid upon my head/but if I did/you could look inside and see what's on my mind..." Ugh. Really?

I'll always have a soft spot for Dave in my heart, but now I look at him and the band almost like old college boyfriends. They were cute at the time, but it was never going to last beyond a couple of road trips to music festivals together.

I still really like the first song on the album, "So Much to Say." And I still say that Carter Beauford is in my All Time Top 5 Drummers, along with Stewart Copeland and Keith Moon. I guess I'm just glad we've all grown up and kinda gone our separate ways now.

Week 2

This week I've been listening to some more music that I haven't listened to in a long time. That's what's so great about this project - rediscovering songs and artists that have been on the shelf too long.

5. Elvis Costello & Allen Toussaint - The River in Reverse

I think I got this album by mistake, actually. Remember Columbia House and BMG? I still belonged to one of those clubs back in 2006 or so. This album came out after Katrina - a somewhat strange collaboration between one of New Orleans' renowned R&B musicians and, well, Elvis Costello. I think this one was the "selection of the month" and I forgot to respond to the email or whatever. I probably wouldn't have gotten this album otherwise. Nothing against either artist - I just didn't really know anything about it beforehand. I had to give this one a couple of listens, and it's not bad, but it's not amazing, either. The album gets off to a slow start, but toward the end there are some really nice songs. I'm glad I gave this one a listen again. It did at least remind me to put the WWOZ app on my phone so I can listen to New Orleans jazz at work or whenever I want. It puts me in a good mood every time.

6. Peer Music: Your Soul Destination Vol. 2

This is the 2nd part of a 2-CD set that was given to me by a good friend that used to work for Malaco Records. To be honest, the 2nd CD isn't as good as the first. The first album has a lot of really classic soul and R&B hits that were recorded on the Malaco label back in the day. The 2nd CD has mostly modern-day songs that either sample the classics, or are just modern songs that were also recorded at Malaco, or that Malaco had the rights to. It was enjoyable enough.

7. Uncle Tupelo - 89/93 Anthology
I was a Wilco fan before I delved into Uncle Tupelo. I like some of Son Volt's stuff, too, but to be honest Jay Farrar's voice grates on my nerves after a while. I remembered most of Uncle Tupelo's music as being of the "sad bastard" variety, and listening to it this week I think I can still kind of classify it as such. There are a few rockin' tunes, and overall it's pretty good driving music, but I did feel kinda bummed out by the end of it.


8. Keane - Hopes and Fears

I just popped this one in today. This album is several years old now, but it still sounds pretty fresh to me. It's just a good pop album. I never noticed before how much the lead singer sounds like Freddie Mercury. Queen is listed as one of the band's influences, so that makes sense I suppose. Queen should've gotten Tom Chaplin to be their new frontman instead of that guy from Bad Company (although he has a great rock voice; it's just not anything like Freddie's operatic tenor).

The Great CD Project of 2012

I'm about to leave for work so this is a really quick post that I will expand on later. I've decided for 2012 to listen to each and every CD I own before the end of the year. Most of this will take place in my car, because that's really the only CD player I still use often. And I'm always getting bored with the radio in the car.

I will blog about the music, to help me remember why I got the album in the first place, or just to review an artist that we have maybe forgotten about over the years.

This first week of the New Year I started out with the following:

Otis Redding - Greatest Hits
VHS or Beta - Bring on the Comets
Bishop Allen - February
The Shins - Oh Inverted World

Will come back later and write more details about these albums. Yippee for new projects and a new year!

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Ok, very quickly, because now it's past my bedtime, a few notes about this week's music:

1. Otis Redding - Greatest Hits
What's not to love about Otis? He's a classic. There isn't a lovelier, more bittersweet tune than "These Arms of Mine," and "Try a Little Tenderness" is one of my all-time favorite feel-good songs.








2. VHS or Beta - Bring on the Comets
This album reminds me of when I first began writing music articles for the Jackson Free Press . BOTC was one of the first albums I was given to review. I had not heard of the group before, but I was pleasantly surprised. The music still holds up pretty well and is fun for driving.







3. Bishop Allen - February
I can actually say that I got into Bishop Allen before anybody else really knew about them. In the very early 2000s, when I still lived in Memphis, I somehow began corresponding with Christian Rudder, who is one of the founding members of the band. I think it had something to do with his website (now defunct) thespark.com and the fact that he was originally from Arkansas. Anyway, he used to let me know when the group was traveling south, and then they got all fancypants and had their music featured in films like Nick and Norah's Infinite Playlist and that "Chuck" show on NBC, and that was the end of that. I still really love their music and I don't think they are capable of writing a song that isn't catchy. "February" is an EP from 2006, when they made an EP for each month of the year. I meant to get all of them, but only have January - March, I think.

Also, Bishop Allen got their name from a street in Cambridge. Christian and Justin Rice, the other founding member of the band, met at Harvard and lived on this street. Furthering the coincidence between myself and the band, my cousin who has lived in Boston for the last several years used to live around the corner from Bishop Allen drive. Here's a picture from my visit there for her wedding back in 2007:













4. The Shins - Oh Inverted World
I didn't realize this album came out in 2001. I don't think I got into the Shins until 2004 or 2005, which makes sense because that's about the time when Garden State came out and introduced the masses to The Shins and a whole lot of other "indie" music. I had not given this album a spin in a long time because I got kind of burnt out on that whole scene, but I have left it in the CD player for a couple of days now because it really does hold up remarkably well. Even if it is (gulp) eleven years later.

Looking forward to what this week will bring!

Don't Expect Much

I'm the worst blogger in the world. My suggestion to you, dear reader, is to drastically lower your expectations of me, and whenever I feel like posting a blog you'll be pleasantly surprised!

Really, there are two things I wanted to post today:

1. My niece is the most awesome kid in the world, and this is coming from a non-kid person. She has the most fun personality and is so outgoing, and I have no idea where this comes from. My sister (her mom) was the shyest kid on earth, and I was a close second. My sister used to cry at the drop of a hat when she was my niece's age, and was scared of everything. Her husband was never a super-outgoing kid, either. So who knows? But I feel like I should document here some of the quirky things that she says and/or gets into. Not to be yet another grownup letting the internets know how cute their kid is, but because I don't want to forget these things. And she might get a kick out of reading them in 20 years, if we haven't moved on to posting on holographic spheres attached to our bellies or something.

So Scottlyn, my niece, like most kids, goes through phases of obsession. The earliest one I can remember her having was either Dora the Explorer or The Wizard of Oz. Dora was pretty fleeting; The Wizard of Oz lasted much, much longer. She watched the movie every day for several months, it seemed. She knew all the songs, all the words to the movie, practically. She got some ruby slippers, she had to have her hair in braids like Dorothy, and she got all the Wizard of Oz Barbie dolls (!) (didn't know that existed before then). We took her to see the live performance at Thalia Mara Hall, and even though we were in the nosebleed section, she still loved it.

From the Wiz she moved on to Batman and Robin. The Wizard of Oz, even though it was filmed in 1939, is kind of a quintessential kids' film. But when she developed her obsession with Batman and Robin, it wasn't 21st century Batman (who would that be, Christian Bale? Please). She went for 1960s Adam West/Burt Ward Batman and Robin. She watched the old shows over and over, and I think developed a crush on Robin. And why not? There's nothing like a trusty sidekick. The Batman thing lasted a while, even though it's not a typical "girl" thing to like. She is also very much into the whole "princess" thing too though.

Lately her affections have turned toward David Bowie. I think it started with my sister playing his music and then showing her some music videos. My sister has good taste in music so she has started early in educating Scottlyn on the classics. Scottlyn loves Queen, too. When she saw/heard "Under Pressure," all bets were off. Two of her favorite things together?!

Scottlyn also loves the movie "The Labyrinth," now, which kinda freaked me out at 9 when it came out, so now I really know that she isn't scared of anything. So she's totally head-over-heels for the Bowie. When her blanket went missing recently? #1 suspect: David Bowie. She really hopes Iman will croak (sorry Iman) so she can marry David Bowie. We don't have the heart to tell her that DB could be her grandfather. Hell, we're kinda hoping it happens (once she is of legal age, of course) so she can get all the loot when he keels over!

And for "Rock Star Day" at school, of course she had to be DB as Ziggy Stardust. I hope to be able to post some pictures soon, but trust me, it was the cutest thing, EVAR. She wants to be his "Labyrinth" character for Halloween. I have already told my sister I'd pay her good $ if part of the costume is a sock down the pants.

For Christmas, I'd really like to get her this Space Oddity book. But it's caught all up in some legal troubles right now, so for the moment it is called "Picture Book Set in Space." Doesn't quite have the same ring to it. In the meantime, I've fallen in love with Kolb's artwork. Isn't it so adorable and retro?

2. The second thing is a totally '80s kid nerd thing. Way back in 1989, yours truly was 12 and therefore not really ready or allowed to hit the wild parties at New Year's. I stayed home with my family, watching Dick Clark's "New Year's Rockin' Eve" and terrorizing my sister with the help of my cousin, who is just a year younger than me.

It was the end of the 1980s, and looking back, I swear we knew that it was the end of an era. There was no way the '90s (or the future in general) would be anything like the '80s, ever. For New Year's Eve, the local radio station was playing a "Mix of the Decade," basically nonstop "remixes" of every '80s song, ever.

Remixes were a big thing in the late '80s. Every pop song that came out on cassette single or 45 usually had a remixed version on the B side. Friday and Saturday nights on the radio were dedicated to dance-remix parties. I can recall recording a song off the radio, only to be disappointed later, "Aw, I didn't want the remixed version." Because, let's face it, as with any trend, sometimes people are doing things just to do them, because it's cool. And a lot of the remixes were really shitty. But! For an event such as New Year's Eve, 1989, it was totally cool to hear all these songs mashed up together for the last time that they'd be played as "music." Beginning January 1, 1990, it was forever to be known as "80s music." And you know that there's a difference. Nobody says "90s music" or "70s music," not really. But when people say "80s music," you know exactly what they are talking about.

So since I was at home being a nerdy 12 year old, I popped in a cassette and recorded at least an hour's worth of these mixes. The show actually went on from some time that afternoon until midnight. In the years to follow, I wore that tape out. As anyone who ever made mixtapes will tell you, the order of songs are burned in your memory if you listened to the tape enough. I don't know what happened to my tape from that evening, but I still expect to hear MJ's "Wanna Be Startin Somethin'" followed by Gloria Estefan's "Conga" followed by The Commodores. I just do.

Fast forward 22 years. Jesus, Mary and Joseph, that was a long time ago! I'm running, training again for a half marathon, and bored to tears with my Ipod playlists. For some inexplicable reason, I start thinking about that tape from NYE '89, and "how cool would that be to have that mix to run to?"

The internet is magic, y'all. A flit of the fingers on the keyboard, and voila': WPLJ Mix of the Decade . And it took me a few listens to find out for sure, but this is the same mix that I recorded way back in the day. Around the 8:30-9:00 timeframe, which I got around to on my 6 mile run this morning, I heard the familiar order of songs from long ago. Hooray!

From the website:

Taped on TDK D90 (Type I) cassettes with Dolby C NR from 95.5 WPLJ-FM/New York by Ron Gerber. The "Mix Of The Decade" aired from 4 PM until midnight on New Years Eve, December 31, 1989. I managed to catch the last 6 hours and 45 minutes of the full 8 hours; I was taping Hot 97's Top Dance Songs Of The '80s countdown, and I switched from Hot 97 to WPLJ as soon as it ended at 5:15 PM. There are several breaks where I had to flip the tapes.

The Mix Of The Decade was put together by Hot Mix; from the Hot Mix website: "Before the start of the first weekly show of 1990, HOT MIX created an 8-hour program called "Mix Of The Decade 1980-89", which ABC agreed to distribute to kick off the new partnership on January 1, 1990. "Mix Of The Decade 1990-89" was distributed on Vinyl disc to over 100 radio stations."

I have never run across another copy of the Mix Of The Decade, and I would be very interested in a more pristine or complete copy; if you or someone you know has one please contact me through the contact link at www.crapfromthepast.com.

This is monstrously huge, and is utterly fantastic. Hope you dig it. -Ron
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A few things I noticed in this blast from the past, and then I swear I'll shut up and you won't hear from me for another 3 months:

1. All the shout-outs and well wishes for a Happy New Year to the NKOTB. People were seriously calling in to the radio station to wish Danny, Donnie, Jordan, Jon and Joey a Happy New Year. I forgot that this was when they were super HUGE. Of course, being a tween at the time, I was a huge fan. NKOTB was my first concert a year or so later.

2. Any runners out there who also like '80s music should really download this (you can DL it from the site above). It's a steady 120 bpm or so, shifts from song to song pretty quickly so your brain doesn't get bored. And it's from friggin' 1989.

3. I've only run across one set of commercials so far, but the ones I did were for the Navy, Doublemint gum, and Sears. Commercial jingles were very melodramatic in the late 1980s, apparently. I was nearly moved to tears with the thought of doubling my pleasure, doubling my fun with a stick of Doublemint gum. Ok not really.

4. There are several songs that I totally forgot about, or don't remember. Artists that were super popular at the time, I suppose, that didn't make it over the hump into the '90s and beyond. And there's a lot of pre-American Idol, pre-drugs-and-falling-over Paula Abdul.

One last thing

Ween proposed a jingle to Pizza Hut about 10 years ago, called "Where'd the Cheese Go?" - it was rejected. So they re-recorded the jingle. Here's both of them. (The second version is NSFW, by the way)



I friggin' love Ween.

Some old B.S.

I'm watching Twin Peaks again on the Netflix* via the Wii. I already know who killed Laura Palmer because of Jeopardy!** But I never actually finished watching the series, so I wanted to give it another go. When the show came out, I was about 13 years old, and either didn't get it, or my parents didn't want me to watch it. I'm thinking it's probably the former, because my P's pretty much let me watch whatever, within reason.

When I moved to Memphis for grad school (about 10 years later), my roommate and her boyfriend and I began watching the series on VHS tape, and got at least into season 2 before I had to move out because the aforementioned roommate was CRAZY. I'm looking forward to silly Kyle MacLachlan and the weird David Lynch-ness of the whole thing.

*I'm really disappointed in the lack of options on Netflix streaming. Anything remotely "new" is unavailable, so I've decided to say "Eff it" and watch old crap from the '80s and '90s until they remedy the situation.

**Can't spell it without the exclamation point! Alex Trebek totally spoiled the ending of this 20-year old series for me the other day. But there's gotta be some kind of statute of limitations on spoiler alerts, so I couldn't be mad.

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Work has been insanely busy lately. I feel like I hardly have time to think, especially to think about my personal life. I'm going to Boston in a couple of weeks to visit my cousin, and I haven't had time at all to think about what to pack, what I'm gonna wear, what we'll do, etc. My hair has grown so long from lack of time to get it cut that I'm giving Crystal Gayle a run for her money. And I've barely had time or energy to exercise, lending to an overall pudgy dough-girl effect. So, rather than find an Eddie Rabbit look-a-like to start singing duets with, I am going to attempt to get back on track within the next week. Chopping my hair, hitting the pavement and the weights, eating better, and (reluctantly) shopping for a swimsuit and other things to wear on my trip. I hear we will spend some time at the beach, and I'm interested to see how a New England beach compares to what I've grown up knowing - the white sands, green water and hot sun of the Gulf Coast. My cousin tells me that the water isn't even warm enough to get in, and that blows my mind. She's also told me they don't have air conditioning. I'm going to try to be a trooper, but I think that even if I lived up there and the weather never got above 90, I'd still like to have some fresh A/C going on. I can't fathom what we Southerners did without it in the past.

Gosh, Kyle MacLachlan looks so young! Gotta go... maybe my next post will be an update from the Boston trip. Or I may just post a bunch of Sifl and Olly links instead.