More mall store memories...Remember when Camelot Music was doing their "Fresh Music" promotion? They had TONS of nu-wave related inventory, and besides a fairly strong selection of US indies, they had hundreds of exotic-looking 12" singles from the UK by bands with weird names like Kajagoogoo and Haysi Fantayzee and Simple Minds and Yazoo, most of whom had not yet or would never crack the US market. I bought a bunch of them at a reduced rate when the "Fresh Music" concept crashed and burned about a year later.

I love some things about the UK 12" singles from this era. They're always really loud, the vinyl is good, and they tend to have deluxe glossy picture sleeves. Unfortunately, most "extended" 12" mixes are simply the same song with the instrumental parts repeated over and over, so the records, despite their beauty as objects, are worthless for listening. Here's an example of the exception, this huge, majestic version of the other really good song from the Icicle Works' debut album. Another good one, one I wish I still had, was the 12" of "(In a) Big Country," which contained two versions of that song, one considerably longer than the US hit single version, and one shorter. The longer version was more interesting, and the short version more concise and powerful than what we heard on the radio here.

Did any of you guys like this band? I recall receiving this album as a graduation gift from my pal David Ring, (who I've lost contact with, and as he's not the kind of guy who probably goes around Googling himself, dropping his name here probably isn't going to help) and subsequently penciling it in as my favorite LP of 1984 for the year-end list bulletin board at Second Time Around Records in Wichita (still maybe my favorite record store ever). I seem to recall ranking it ahead of, for example Meat Puppets II (which actually came out in '83, but indie rock records didn't really have street dates back then, and besides, I was in friggin' Pratt, KS, so give me a break already) which seems a bit dubious, but then this thing did have the Sound Of Jon's Bedroom, ca. 1984; it sounded like a cross between REM and U2/Big Country. Many tracks were used on mix tapes, and I memorized the entire LP in a way I almost never do with a current release.

Uh...I didn't like their next album as much.

Absolute lack of chart success notwithstanding, there is an absurd tendency to regard the Only Ones as a one-hit wonder. And while "Another Girl, Another Planet" is without doubt one of the supreme cultural acheivements of Western Civilization and the band's greatest song, it is hardly the only Little Hit by a band who made three consistently excellent LPs. The band had more chops than most (especially ex-Spooky Tooth guitarist John Perry, who does amazing things with regularity) and one of the great songwriters of the era, Peter Perret, who deserves the kind of hosannas regularly (and rightly) flung at guys like Robyn Hitchcock. This was in fact, one of the greatest bands of the late 70s, and everyone who is not already familiar should not hesitate to pick up Why Don't You Kill Yourself: The CBS Recordings, which contains the 3 LPs as well as some B-sides and things. It was difficult indeed to pick just one great track, but Perret's vocal on this stunner from the 2nd LP just kills us.

This is the B-side of their version of "Ring Of Fire."

Some of the best 60s 45s are the result of a band copping superficial aspects of their heroes' style and blowing those aspects up to ridiculous proportions. Example: This bald faced Who cop, which despite it's obviously derivative nature is nearly as exciting as the genuine article. This can be found on Wild Things Vol. 2 (Zero Records), which like the first volume, is a uniformly excellent collection of rare New Zealand beat.

I've always suspected that what attracted me to this record was really the amazing SOUND rather than the songs. "Produced by Liam Sternberg in an aircraft hangar" sez the jacket; clearly the goal was Maximum Rock and Reverb. However it is worth noting that while this is my favorite track from the EP, Rhino selected "Not My Memory" for the Children of Nuggets box set (out on the 27th), and I believe Andrew Chalfen would opt for "Gun Fighting Man." That should be some indicator of the songs' quality and consistency, so I think the Unknowns earn some credit for that.

I bet they were something to see. The jacket sort of hints that they were. By the way, lead singer Bruce Joyner's cane was not a mere prop; he was partially paralyzed as the result of a car accident. According to one website he also lost an eye in his youth, and was seriously injured at the age of four when he was given some chloride crystals by a neighbor girl and told they were rock candy.

Someday when I write that huge, lavishly illustrated coffee-table book on Flying Nun Records, I can verify some of the stories that have become part of the label's legend, like the one about the Jean-Paul Sartre Experience showing up at the FN Christmas party and asking to play. According to the Flying Nun trading cards (Yes!) this is exactly what happened, which of course, led to several releases. "Shadows" is perhaps the most beautiful thing the band ever came up with, but there are plenty of great tunes throughout the discography.

Clovis Roblaine is a talented Oklahoma multi-instrumentalist. His lone LP encompasses a variety of classic rock (as opposed to "classic rock") styles: girl groups, vocal and instrumental surf tunes, mersybeat, Buddy Holly, and a pinch of doo-wop. It is unfailingly charming. Roblaine has since been spotted with surf instro combo The Plungers.

I kind of worked my way backward through the TVP's catalog, and this was the first of their albums I heard, so I associate this band with the early 90s as much as with the early 80s. I think this was one Cody Ochs brought 'round the house along with Pere Ubu's Cloudland and The Stone Roses. It was, needless to say, an excellent spring/summer.

As much as I dearly love it, I don't put a lot of vintage soul up here for several reasons. Chief among them: the fact that I don't know that much about it and the fact that there are many superior audio blogs devoted to this very subject. However, I thought perhaps some of you might enjoy the change of pace provided by this 45, which I heard for the first time during a set by Superwolf over in KC (between sets of this Nuggets/Pebbles cover band I was playing in at the time). I dig the way the James Brown verses swerve into the Wilson Pickett chorus. And check the fade out, where our afflicted vocalist tells us that if he weren't in so much pain "I think I'd do that thing/They call the shing-a-ling." I feel that way every day of my life.

I don't know if this has appeared on any of those Kent (UK) CDs that excavate gems from the Atlantic Records catalog, but you can still get the original single pretty cheap. And unlike some of the 45s that seem to be all the rage ($$$!), it's a great record, meaning "it's a good song," as opposed to "it has five seconds of really cool drums on it."

Rusty Willoughby has a knack for knocking 'em out in a manner both snotty and tuneful. Perhaps that's because they never seem to say more than is absolutely necessary. Here are a couple of Mickey's favorites from the first Flop LP, neither of which hit 2:00. Mr. Willoughby had a Sub Pop 45 in 1999 and currently has a new band called Llama. You can keep up with his projects here.

I always had this 45 around, but I never realised what a good song it really was until I heard Franklin Bruno do a live solo version of it. It's on the Valley Girl soundtrack too, but does anyone know if their Slash LP was any good?

Here, in a nutshell, is the evolution of Boston's beloved Neighborhoods, from the mod/pop leanings of the first single (the band photo on the back of the sleeve bears this out) to the middle of the decade, when they'd assimilated the same beloved-in-their-youth hard rock bands that infected the Replacements. "Arrogance" is probably the best song on a good album. I saw them a couple of years later after they signed to Imago; the deal seemed to have bought them a lot of shiny new gear. By that point they were a fine bar band (not as common a commodity as you might think, especially nowadays) but not much more.

Nixon's Head, from Philadelphia, came recommended by our old pals the Wishniaks, and turned out to be a fairly typical group of rock 'n' roll-smitten young men who decided to have a go. Despite some tasteful and nifty material, they labored in obscurity, much like Philly pop peers Flight of Mavis and the aforementioned Wishniaks. Besides two solid EPs, they indulged in a good bit of side-project/alter ego tomfoolery under names like Frankenslade and the Autumn Carousel, then reformed in the late 90s to make another couple of records. They're hanging in there. The band was headed by trivia expert/Groove Disques guy Jim Slade; make sure to visit the label's web site for his well-considered thoughts on the correct way to write and play rock music, as well as the latest Trolleyvox news.

In our effort to bring you all of the Feelies-related stuff we can find, here's a track by the Trypes, the Feelies side project that eventually turned into Speed The Plough. The Trypes also had a lovely EP on Coyote, "The Explorer's Hold" which featured a cover of George Harrison's "Love You To," as well as "The Undertow," a track that would later appear on a Feelies LP.

Sorry about the noise on this track. I tried several copies of this album, and none of them were terribly satisfactory.

There is no way of knowing for sure,what with memories being eroded by age and abuse and the notion that things used to be better, so just grant me this: The 'Trippers version of the Kinks' "See My Friend" may have been the best cover I ever heard. They never recorded it, but it was on the set list purt' reg'lar for awhile. Drummer Mark Bruggeman flailed about in an eerily Moon-esque fashion while bassist Scott Stecklein did some McCartney bits and the whole thing just exploded in a whirl of modcolor. It was friggin' HUGE, I tell ya...

Iowa City's Dangtrippers are one of my favorite bands of all time, because they played in Lawrence quite frequently throughout the late 80s, and my friends and I had wild crazy drunken intellectual bad-dancing FUN every time. They were a great cover band; among the ones I can remember are: "In the Street," "Foxhole," "Bangkok," "Dr. Robert," "Glory," "Lucifer Sam," "Changeless," "Brontosaurus," and "When You Dance I Can Really Love." They cranked out great renditions of these classics, for they could all play and sing very nicely, and they did so long before playing a Big Star or Television song would impress more than four people in the audience. Their original material was fine as orange juice as well, as a listen to their albums demonstrates. When the What Gives actually became a band, I had the Dangtrippers in mind as the live act I would most like to emulate.

Their recorded output, compared to their strength as a club attraction, is merely magnificent. It didn't capture the full-on sonic wallop of the rhythm section, and isn't quite as wired as the band was onstage in a sweaty bar. Nevertheless, it is all well worth seeking out, especially the Days Between Stations LP on REM manager Jefferson Holt's Dog Gone label, which neatly explored the tension between Devin Hill's pure pop longings and Doug Roberson's quirky psychedelic leanings (though Roberson certainly knew his way around a hook as well).

As DBS was being released, Devin Hill left the band to be replaced by Pat White, trading winsomeness for some muscle without affecting the quality of the band much. Hill went on to make a couple of nice records for the short-lived Big Deal label. The Dangtrippers dissolved in the early 90s, at which point Roberson formed Head Candy who did an LP on Link that I really should track down. When that folded he went the retro route, first with some of his Dangtrippers pals in the Bent Scepters, and then with the Hammond grooving Diplomats of Solid Sound, where he currently resides. (According to their Website, they're appearing in Lawrence on Saturday at the Gaslight.)

Not exactly punk according to any orthodoxy, this compilation of lo-fi recordings of some of the Urinals' favorite (mostly) Californian contemporaries is an absolute joy, from the fake funk of the Earwigs to the junkyard exotica of the Human Hands and way out beyond. Oh yeah, there's this great early Gun Club track too. The new re-issue contains one bonus track apiece from all of the bands what appeared on the original comp, plus the tracks from the Urinals-based Happy Squid Sampler 7". A wonderful document to place on your shelf right next to the Homework CDs from Hyped2Death.

Also, some kind folks have seen fit to issue the Warfrat Tales compilation from 1983 in a new unabridged version which, like the Keats CD, contains tracks from the Gun Club, 100 Flowers, The Earwigs, and the Urinals, as well as stuff from the Last, Rain Parade, Wednesday Week, and more.

This is one of my favorite pop records of all time, and I can't decide which part of it I'm supposed to go aroung singing. Too many hooks! This LA band, of which Emmit Rhodes was briefly the drummer, has had their 45s compiled on a Gear Fab CD. This track also appars on the first Nuggets box.

Wow! This record actually rises to the level of greatness suggested by the sleeve. A record that is NOT as good as the sleeve is the Stomachmouths' Voxx Records LP, which consists of demos and live stuff and isn't a patch on any of their proper Swedish releases that we've heard.

Folks will go on about Dinosaur Jr. and pre-WB Flaming Lips, but to me, these guys were THE psychedelic guitar band of the 80s. The extremely inventive interplay of Guy Kyser and Roger Kunkel's snaking guitars was supplemented nicely by judicious use of feedback, and whether the rhythm section was the weird and weedy one (first two albums) or the relentlessly piledriving one (everything else) there was always a splendid backdrop for Kyser's truly damaged world view and Tom Petty-as-possessed-by-Satan vocals. We lean a little more to the early records, but this band never did anything halfway.

This was one of many recorded TWR covers, many of which were rounded up on the odds and sods compilation Spoor (Frontier). Another one we like a lot is their version of Can's "Yoo Doo Right," from Sack Full Of Silver, which I find far more exciting than the original.