According to the liner notes of Dive Into Yesterday, a fine anthology of this amazing UK psych band, "Jenny Artichoke" was written as a desperate attempt at a hit single, and you can sort of tell. It's just absurdly catchy in a way that probably would have driven you nuts had you been forced to hear it over and over, but for some reason, like several other brilliant Kaleidoscope records it didn't sell. My wife Kit and I absolutely love this song; several other friends have also admitted a fondness, albeit with a sheepish expression. It's easy to tell your hipster friends you like "Flight From Ashiya," but something like this might be closer to what we mean by the term "guilty pleasure."

This awesome version of the Patti Smith classic later appeared on a promo 12" for a track from the Only Life LP; it may be the best of their B-side covers. I've also got nifty versions of "White Light White Heat," Jonathan Richman's "Now I Wanna Sleep In Your Arms," and Neil Young's "Barstool Blues." Does anyone have their version of "Egyptian Reggae?" I've never been able to track that one down.

Also, in their brief performance as the party band in the movie Something Wild, the Feelies (possibly as Yung Wu) performed "Fame" and "I'm a Believer." Has anybody ever heard the complete versions of those? I assume that they exist...

You know what I'm tired of? I'm tired of hearing rock music everywhere I go.

Sure, part of this rant has to do with the occupational hazard of working in a record store, but that's hardly the full extent of it. I go into the Chipotle to get some iced tea and I hear Sly and the Family Stone and James Carr. I go to the grocery store and I hear Aztec Camera or Roxy Music. I don't go to the Gap but I'm told you might hear the Fiery Furnaces there. When did we decide that we need to have rock music, much less relentlessly hip rock music accompanying every mundane aspect of our lives?

An excess of any commodity makes it less precious. As a pre-pubescent I remember pulling the clock radio under the blankets at bedtime, keeping the volume low to avoid parental hassles, hoping to hear just one more song before I went to sleep. Mine surely must have been the last generation to do this. Why would anybody bother doing that now? For heavens sake, tomorrow you can watch TV all day, and the commercials have plenty of cool tunes in them. When I used to check groceries, I couldn't wait to get home at the end of the day, because then I could play a record. If I still worked at that same grocery store, I'd get to bask in yuppie-friendly edginess ("Wow, man, Prefab Sprout. That's crazy!") all day long, and I'd probaby feel like doing what I do now when I get home from work, which is anything but listening to music.

And when did we all get so hip? Are all advertising agencies and marketing firms run by former college radio DJs these days? "But wouldn't you rather hear the Smiths than Britney Spears while you're waiting in line for Tacos?" Maybe. But maybe not. I don't have any emotion invested in Britney Spears; it's white noise to me. But to have something I actually loved used to create an ambience of hip so that white, college-educated people will know that this is a good place for discerning people with sophisticated taste to spend their money...well, that siphons some of the magic from those times when I may decide to play that music in an environment of my own choice. And if the process is repeated enough, the magic disappears completely. If something is used as background music long enough, it ceases to be capable of being anything else. If something is saturated for long enough, no matter how beautiful and powerful it may be, it will grow tired and trivial. Witness the destruction baby boomers have wrought upon the catalogues of the Beatles and Motown Records.

Don't think it can't happen to Joy Division.

Martin Newell is a fascinating figure with an extensive discography, as his entry at the Trouser Press site attests. It has never been easy to find his Cleaners From Venus recordings, especially the homemade tapes they were issuing in the early 80s. In 1997 Jarmusic of Germany released Don't Step On My Rainbow, a box set consisting of 5 7" EPs with four songs each, that purported to be some of the best tracks from the Cleaners' cassette-only period. It's a pretty cool object really, there's a photo book and a postcard and some other odds and ends. The music is great too, recalling the Beatles, the Jam, XTC, and on a cover of Syd Barrett's "Late Night," the Cure.

A while back I received in the mail a package from my old pal Debby Vanderwall containing a book by Giles Smith called Lost In Music, and I think it's fair to say that if you're the sort who has ever had an argument with your significant other about how long you've been in the record store, you need to get your hands on this. It offers Smith's thoughts on some vital matters including his youthful obsession with Marc Bolan, the lies people tell about what the first record they ever bought was, and his tenure as a member of Cleaners From Venus. It is an absolute delight.

This strange garage track with the vampire guy singing puzzles even Shamrock J. Cat, our resident authority on acne-ridden teenagers with Rickenbackers and Beatle Boots. We just can't decide to which sub-genre of 60s garage rock it belongs. Is it the "See you in Hell" category as exemplified by the Sonics' "He's Waitin'?" Or would it more correctly be placed in the "maniacal laughter" category along such classics as "Good Times" by Nobody's Children and "Little Girl" by the Syndicate of Sound? And anyway, how did something like this end up on what was for all intents and purposes a major label?

One thing we can tell you with considerable clarity is that Sundazed Records' new Garage Beat '66 series is what the kids like to call "the bomb." Great track selection with plenty of genuine rarities, including some tracks I'd been wanting to hear for years, excellent liner notes, and the best sound quality ever on any re-issue of this particular genre. "Shame On You" is on Vol. 1, as is the absolutely manic "Hipsville 29 B.C. (I Need Help)" by the Sparkles, a great jangly version of P.F. Sloan's "I'd Have To Be Out Of My Mind" by Words of Luv, and other oddball stuff tending toward the tougher, heavily fuzz-toned end of the genre. The other two volumes currently available are of similar quality, with two more due June 7. A bit more expensive than some of the other compilations, but absolutely worth it. Try one.

Whether the name on the label is the Holy Rollers, the Beautiful Losers, or his own, a Greg Dear songwriting credit is an assurance of quality. Not exactly like the Birdman lovers or the shiny hard pop bands that were so prevelant in Australia at the time, Dear seemed to be mining some fairly trad American sources in a similar fashion to that of US bands like Zeitgeist (later the Rievers). Actually, there were a number of Australian bands doing this, Harum Scarum, Porcelain Bus...but I digress. While we feel pretty confident that we have the 7" realm covered, but we're still trying to track down the LPs, which seem to be a tough score. There's one by the Beautiful Losers, and at least one by the Holy Rollers...can anybody tell us more?

The UK Favourites made two terrific singles; after much deliberation, we have decided to run this one, a cover of some Swedish band I forget the name of. The morse code guitar bit is pertty clever, no? Their other single, "Angelica"/"Cold," besides being another solid two-sider, had a great sleeve, a parody of Blondie's Eat To the Beat LP. All the singles tracks plus demos are available on a vinyl LP (sorry, no CD) on the Low Down Kids website.