1. Murray McLauchlan, Hard Rock Town . . . It’s a deep cuts show but I deviate sometimes. This was a hit and appropriate to a set full of hard rock or at least up-tempo tracks. I also got into a ‘thing’ with song titles about, you’ll see it’s obvious, and couldn’t seem to stop for a while. Whatever, what’s done is done. Good tunes, in any event. Some repeats from fairly recent previous shows I think but again, so be it.

2. The Beatles, Why Don’t We Do It In The Road? . . . And so starts a sort of topic you’ll see reflected in the song titles of the next several, including another Beatles’ tune.

3. AC/DC, Givin The Dog A Bone . . . As lead singer Brian Johnson was once quoted as saying, ‘we’re a filthy band.” Applies to the next several tunes, so just listing them, no comment until I pick it up again.

4. Led Zeppelin, The Lemon Song

5. Frank Zappa, Dirty Love

    

6. Dead Kennedys, Too Drunk To Fuck

7. Ted Nugent, Just What The Doctor Ordered

8. Graham Parker & The Rumour, Protection . . . Not really what I’m on about with the topic, but the title fits my silly narrative, ha.

9. The Beatles, Getting Better . . . Were this song released today, it likely would provoke controversy given the lyrics: “I used to be cruel to my woman I beat her…” But, it’s one of my musical favorites from the Sgt. Pepper album.

10. Metallica, Ain’t My Bitch . . . From the controversial Load album, where fans accused the band of selling out, even more than they were accused of doing on the previous monster hit ‘black’ album. They still sold millions, attracted new fans, and their entire catalog has merit so, relax.

11. The Rolling Stones, Bitch . . . One of my favorite tunes by my favorite band, and on Mick Jagger’s birthday, to boot. Still going strong at age 78.

12. Black Sabbath, Digital Bitch . . . From the one and only album the band did, 1983, with Deep Purple lead singer Ian Gillan. A controversial album, but I and many Sabs fans maintain, a good one.

13. Deep Purple, Lady Double Dealer . . . Good rocker from the Stormbringer album, typically good co-lead vocals by David Coverdale and Glenn Hughes during that period of the band. Love Hughes’ ‘oh baby’ in one of the verses early in the song, just adds a cool element to the track.

14. Judas Priest, Ram It Down . . . Title cut from the album and just an absolute scorcher.

15. Blue Oyster Cult, Hot Rails To Hell . . . Great riff on this pulsating track from the Tyranny and Mutation album.

16. Midnight Oil, Redneck Wonderland . . . Title cut from the almost metallic, somewhat industrial sound of the band’s 1998 album. One of my favorites by the Oils.

17. Elvis Costello (I Don’t Want To Go To) Chelsea . . . A single that didn’t do well outside the UK, from This Year’s Model in 1978. Likely has become better known over time as it’s been included on many compilation albums.

18. Motorhead, Speedfreak . . . The song lives up to the title. Typical Motorhead madness, which is a good thing.

19. Yes, Machine Messiah . . . And now for a total change of direction, to Yes’s 1980 Drama album, a hard-edged offering by the revamped band now (then) featuring imports from The Buggles in singer Trever Horn and keyboardist Geoff Downes. Great song, great album.

20. Golden Earring, Candy’s Going Bad . . . Love the riff on this rocker from Moontan, the album which of course gave the world Radar Love but revealed the band to be SO much more than that song. A wall to wall great album, this song (among just five extended cuts on the record) an indication of that.

21. The Kinks, 20^th Century Man . . . Said it a million times about Muswell Hillbillies, a criminally underappreciated (at least commercially) album that for my money is one of the greatest rock/pop albums ever released by one of the greatest bands ever.

22. King Crimson, 21^st Century Schizoid Man . . . Lead cut, and the heaviest rocker on the brilliant In The Court Of The Crimson King debut album in 1969. It remains my favorite Crimson record.

23. The Beach Boys, Sloop John B . . . One of the more commercial cuts from Pet Sounds, the highly-acclaimed album that, aside from this and Wouldn’t It Be Nice, took me about seven billion listens to ‘get’ but I do now ‘get’ it and it’s brilliant. Decided to play this one after discussing great ‘summer’ music with a buddy; he was playing the B-52s so that same day I happened to pop a Beach Boys’ compilation into the car player and thought, yeah, I’ll play this one on my next show.

24. Johnny Winter, Highway 61 Revisited . . . Yet another great Winter cover, this being the studio version of the Bob Dylan track which Winter released on Second Winter, his 1969 album. It’s the song that got me into Winter, I heard it wherever, found the album, bought it and became a Winter fan. Saw him at the 2011 Kitchener Blues Festival, he along with brother Edgar was one of several big names on the bill that year, the others being Gregg Allman and John Mayall. I saw all four, all were great even if by that time, Johnny was in declining health, needing assistance and sitting down through his set, but still smokin’ hot.

25. Paul McCartney/Wings, Morse Moose And The Grey Goose . . . A fun extended track by Macca, from 1978’s London Town album. Reminds me in some ways, in terms of structure at least, of McCartney’s Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey in that it’s essentially several songs in one.

     

26. Faces, Had Me A Real Good Time . . . I just know I’ve recently closed a show with this track and I don’t like repeating myself (at least, not too closely together) but what the heck. Occured to me as I was prepping the show, because I always have a good time doing it, and so here it is, from one of the great raunch and roll bands of all.

1. Chris Isaak, Let’s Have A Party . . . Isaak became well known via his big hit Wicked Game, which to me remains his best song and, released in 1989, is now more than 30 years old! But Isaak’s other material is top-notch; I’m not a major fan but I do like this rocker and much of his other stuff. He does a nice cover of Cheap Trick’s I Want You To Want Me which I almost chose, but thought we’d start the party with this one.

2. Kenny Rogers and The First Edition, Just Dropped In (To See What Condition My Condition Was In) . . . I like and respect Kenny Rogers’ later work that turned him into a superstar but have always gravitated to his two big hit songs – this one and Ruby, Don’t Take Your Love To Town – while with the First Edition, who I remember hosting the show Rollin’ on Canadian TV, early 1970s. I first heard Ruby when my dad, who emigrated from Europe after WW2, played it. He was more into classical and opera but also had a love for American country music so probably liked Ruby due to it being written by Mel Tillis and was curious about the First Edition’s cover. Mel’s version is much more country/rockabilly than the rockier First Edition version.

3. Ron Wood, Am I Grooving You . . . From Woody’s first solo album, 1974’s I’ve Got My Own Album To Do and a track which quickly became one of my favorites. I always play a Stones’ or Stones-related track on the show, they being my all-time favorite band and I’ve Got My Own Album To Do is a real demonstration of what I like to call Stones Inc. Mick Jagger and Keith Richards appear on it and contributed two songs (Act Together and Sure The One You Need), then-Stone (who Wood replaced) Mick Taylor contributes guitar, bass and synthesizer and it’s truly, beyond the Stones, an all-star cast on the record. Also appearing to varying degrees are George Harrison, David Bowie, Rod Stewart…terrific album.

    

4. Ten Years After, 50,000 Miles Beneath My Brain . . . TYA is likely most widely known for the immortal version of Goin’ Home from Woodstock and their wonderful single I’d Love To Change The World. But, led by Alvin Lee, such a solid band, great, consistent blues-rock material with some elements of psychedelia as on this one from 1970’s front-to-back solid Cricklewood Green album.

5. Deep Purple, Shield . . . From The Book of Taliesyn album, the middle one of their first three albums representing the early psychedelic/progressive side of the band before Ian Gillan and Roger Glover replaced original singer Rod Evans and bassist Nick Simper, respectively, in 1970 for the In Rock album. As I’ve often stated, I like every version/lineup of Deep Purple, major fan, but over the years have really dug into the first three albums, which I think are brilliant.

6. Van Morrison, Tupelo Honey . . . Title cut from his 1972 album. Great stuff, one of my favorite Van The Man tracks. Made No. 35 and 47, respectively, on the Canadian and US singles charts.

7. Atlanta Rhythm Section, Champagne Jam . . These guys were pretty hot for a while there in the mid- to late 1970s what with great singles like So Into You and Imaginary Lover, which they played when I saw them as one of three opening acts for The Rolling Stones’ July 4, 1978 show at what was then known as Rich Stadium, outside Buffalo, where the NFL’s Bills play. ARS opened with this title cut from their 1978 album which they were touring behind that year. Other acts on that Stones’ bill were Journey and April Wine, but we missed April Wine, dammit, due to our tour bus being stuck in a massive traffic jam heading into the stadium. Fantastic day, though, my first time seeing the Stones.

8. Emerson, Lake & Powell, Mars, The Bringer Of War . . . Yes, Emerson, Lake & Powell, not Palmer. More on that in a minute. Anyway, a slightly different ELP’s version of the first movement (of seven) from English composer Gustav Holst’s great epic 49-minute orchestral suite The Planets, written between 1914 and 1917. It appeared on the one and only Emerson, Lake & Powell album, in 1986. The band wanted to do a new Emerson, Lake & Palmer album but Palmer was contractually tied up with the band Asia at the time so, after unsuccessfully auditioning a few drummers, they contacted Powell, a friend of Emerson’s, and voila! Fortuitously, given Powell’s surname they could keep the ELP moniker although, according to Wikipedia, the band did approach ‘Phil Pollins’ and ‘Ringo Parr’ before Powell agreed to join. What a diverse artist Cozy Powell was: Metal/hard rock (Black Sabbath, Rainbow, etc.) blues (some work with Peter Green), progressive rock (ELP).

9. Tipton, Entwistle and Powell, Walls Cave In . . . And here’s Powell in another combo with Glenn Tipton of Judas Priest and John Entwistle of Who fame. This is from the Edge Of The World album released by Tipton in 2006, after his mates had passed, but dating back to sessions he did with Entwistle and Powell between 1994 and 1997 that were intended for Tipton’s 1997 solo album, Baptizm of Fire. According to Tipton’s liner notes, the majority of his work on what became Baptizm of Fire featured Entwistle and Powell. The record company liked the material but suggested the band was too ‘old school’ and that Tipton use younger musicians, which he did on an album that, among other songs, included a cover of the Stones’ Paint It Black. I played Tipton’s cover eons ago on the show and will again, it’s a cool metallic treatment of the Stones’ classic. But Tipton liked the unused material done with Entwistle and Powell and decided to put it together and release it as a tribute to his friends.

    

10. Moon Martin, Hot Nite In Dallas . . . Remember him, of Rolene fame? And he wrote Bad Case Of Loving You (Doctor Doctor) which Robert Palmer rode to hit status in 1979. Martin was (died in 2020 of natural causes at age 74) really good. Great, usually up tempo rocker stuff. Check out a ‘mix’ of his on YouTube sometime. Oh, real name John David Martin, apparently given the nickname Moon due to the presence of ‘moon’ in many of his lyrics.

11. Nick Lowe, I Love The Sound Of Breaking Glass . . . What a great artist Nick Lowe is and that thought was reinforced as I was working through his material and reminding myself to play him again/more often, while prepping the show. He came to wide prominence, arguably, with the Labour of Lust album in 1979, which is when and where I discovered him, brilliant album. This is from the preceding record, also great, his first solo effort, Jesus Of Cool, in 1978. The album was re-titled Pure Pop For Now People (a slogan on the original UK release) with a different track listing in the USA. Haven’t been able to find a definite reason but given US religious bullshit I can imagine Jesus Of Cool wouldn’t fly in some of the colonies, as some insult on Jesus. Anyway, great tune from a great artist who was also a member of Brinsley Schwarz, for whom he wrote the song (What’s So Funny ‘Bout) Peace, Love & Understanding that became a hit for Elvis Costello, Rockpile (with Dave Edmunds) and Little Village (with John Hiatt, Ry Cooder and Jim Keltner). And latter day, Lowe has some terrific rockabilly, countryish, singer songwriter stuff.

12. The Beatles, Cry Baby Cry . . . Haven’t played the boys in a while, some of their solo work but overdue for a Beatles’ tune. One of my favorites from the white album, such a great record and such great vocals by John Lennon on this one. Plus the cool “Can You Take Me Back” coda sung by Paul McCartney at the end. These guys were ridiculously good.

13. David Wilcox, God Is On A Bender . . . Given the usual state of the world, yeah, probably. Actually, the world to me is OK. It’s the people in it, me included, that cause problems. Just kidding. Sort of. Maybe. Sometimes. Anyway, nice bluesy fun tune and a nice intro to the next one, by title, at least.

14. Paul Rodgers, Morning After The Night Before . . . From Rodgers’ solo debut in 1983 after the first, classic original version of Bad Company broke up. He played all instruments on this one, produced the record and it may as well have been another Bad Co. album. Quite good. I had already planned to play this tune but was gratified on Sunday when someone on Twitter asked about albums that were truly ‘solo’ and I put forward this one, to great feedback.

15. Patti Smith, Are You Experienced . . . from Smith’s covers album, Twelve, released in 2007. This cover of a Hendrix tune goes out to my old pal Gerry Telford with whom, when I played another Smith track recently, I got into a discussion of her work and I recommended he try this album along with what he was recently discovering in her catalog. Did you get it yet, Gerry? 🙂

16. Concrete Blonde, Walking In London . . . She’s not as well widely known, likely, but I really think Johnette Napolitano is one of the all-time best female rock singers, and singers, period. Sultry, throaty, sexy, powerful, great range, just brilliant. Evidenced, to me, by this title cut from the now defunct band’s 1992 album.

17. Joe Jackson, Right and Wrong . . . from one of my favorite artist’s Big World album, 1986. About Ronald Reagan, great, typically cutting Jackson lyrics. Could apply at any time, really. I saw the tour promoting this album, first time (of two) I saw JJ. Great show.

18. Sniff ‘n’ The Tears, Poison Pen Mail . . . These guys are much more than the brilliant hit single Driver’s Seat. Like this song. Usually considered a one-hit wonder and I get it, but try more of their tunes if you’re so inclined and there’s lots more good stuff.

19. Montrose, Space Station No. 5 . . . From whence Sammy Hagar sprang. Great rocker from the debut, self-titled Montrose album.

20. Goddo, Anacanapana/So Walk On . . . These ‘have’ to be played together for the transition alone, between the instrumental and into So Walk On. I saw Goddo 5-6 years ago in Cambridge, Ontario in a wonderful reunion with some old childhood friends from Peru. A great show enjoyed by all.

21. The Allman Brothers Band, Instrumental Illness (live) . . . This extended cut first appeared on what turned out to be the final studio album by the boys, Hittin’ The Note in 2003. Twelve minutes on the album, this is the almost 17-minute version from the great live album by the latter-day band, One Way Out. There is an extended drum solo within but still, what to me has always made the Allmans great is how they can do long tracks, particularly instrumentals, and never bore you.
    

1. J.J. Cale, Rock And Roll Records . . . As some of the comments in the YouTube clip of this song suggest, only thing wrong with J.J. Cale’s music is that most of his songs are too/so short. Like this one, at just two minutes, five seconds to kick us off.
   
2. Aerosmith, Lightning Strikes . . .Great track, likely the best, from the Rock In A Hard Place album in 1982, the band’s only record not to feature guitarist Joe Perry. Jimmy Crespo replaced him. Regardless, still one of the band’s best songs in my opinion and I play it in honor of the Tampa Bay Lightning winning the Stanley Cup – even though I’m a Montreal Canadiens’ fan. Great team though, the Lightning. Good for them.

3. The Law, Laying Down The Law . . . This was the successful, No. 1 on some charts, single from the one-off 1991 project by Paul Rodgers (Free, Bad Company) and Kenney Jones (Faces/Small Faces, Who) in 1991. Main guitarist on the album was studio session man Jim Barber, who has worked on Mick Jagger’s solo records. Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour, Bryan Adams and Chris Rea also appeared as did latter-day Who bassist Pino Paladino.

4. The Rolling Stones, Hand Of Fate . . . Back, for a second straight week (played Melody last week) I go to the Black and Blue album for one of my favorite Stones’ tunes. Great solo by Wayne Perkins, who has an extensive resume including work with Lynyrd Skynyrd, Eric Clapton, Bob Marley, on and on.

5. Stevie Wonder, Black Man . . . Typically great funk groove, even better lyrics, perhaps, in Wonder’s call for worldwide interracial harmony.

6. Quicksilver Messenger Service, Fresh Air . . . The most successful single, made No. 49 in 1970, from the San Francisco-area psychedelic band whose arguably better-known contemporaries from that scene include the Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane.

7. Billy Gibbons, Desert High . . . ZZ Top is still around, apparently planning another studio album and tour after a 50^th anniversary tour was put on hold due to the covid-19 pandemic. In the meantime, guitarist Billy Gibbons got into the solo album game six years ago and is now up to three releases. This great bluesy tune is from his latest work, Hardware, out just a month ago and a truly fine album.

8. Tim Curry, Simplicity . . . Another slow bluesy tune from the Rocky Horror Picture Show’s Dr. Frank-N-Furter. Title cut from the multi-talented Curry’s third and, to date, final album, in 1981. Sadly, Curry suffered a stroke in 2012 and is confined to a wheelchair but continues to do voice-over work and some musical performances.

9. David Bowie, The Width Of A Circle . . . Amazing early Bowie from The Man Who Sold The World, featuring the late great Mick Ronson on guitar.

10. Saga, Humble Stance . . . I don’t think I’ve ever played Saga, from my hometown of Oakville, Ontario, on the show. An oversight rectified by yet another plow through my CD collection and an “oh yeah, these guys.” Jaunty rocker, this, Supertramp-like, to my ears, at least in spots. Or maybe the other way around, Supertramp sounds like Saga. Regardless, good stuff.

11. The Flying Burrito Brothers, Sin City . . . And now for something completely different. No, not something by the Monty Python troupe but some cool country rock by the Burritos.

12. AC/DC, Sin City . . . And here’s AC/DC’s version of the Burritos’ tune. Just kidding. Different song and one of my favorites by the hard rockers, Bon Scott era.

13. Pretenders, Dance . . . I love this one from the Get Close album, 1986. Funky, hypnotic, almost electronic. Not what one would expect from Pretenders, probably, if one knows only their hits.

14. David Baerwald, Dance . . . And Baerwald’s version of the Pretenders’ tune. Just kidding again and obviously having way too much fun with song titles. Different song, this one from the guy who came to prominence on the fabulous David + David album Boomtown, teaming with David Ricketts for their one and only offering in 1986. Dance is from Baerwald’s debut solo album, Bedtime Stories, in 1990. He releases music sporadically but is active in songwriting for film and television. Ricketts went into production work after David + David split up, and both Davids played on Sheryl Crow’s 1993 debut album, Tuesday Night Music Club.

15. Albert King, I’ll Play The Blues For You (Parts 1 and 2) . . . Such soulful vocals, and of course great guitar, by one of the masters of the blues.

16. Howlin’ Wolf, I Asked For Water . . . And she brought him gasoline. Great stuff from another blues master.

17. Alvin Lee, The Bluest Blues . . . George Harrison plays slide guitar on this slow blues from Lee, famous of course from his days with Ten Years After. It came out in 1994. Wonderful work by both guys, both sadly long gone now.

18. Rod Stewart, Fool For You . . . My favorite Rod Stewart solo period is 1969-74 when he was usually backed by Faces, with whom he maintained a parallel career. But his stuff after that, up to 1977’s Foot Loose & Fancy Free, is damn good as well. This one’s from his 1976 big hit album, A Night On The Town.

19. Bachman-Turner Overdrive, Flat Broke Love . . . One of my favorites by the band, from 1975’s Four Wheel Drive. For the most part, I prefer BTO’s songs sung by C.F. (Fred) Turner, and this is another of those.

20. Black Sabbath, Who Are You . . . I always think of my Grade 10 English class when I listen to 1973’s Sabbath Bloody Sabbath album. I wasn’t into the band then, that came a bit later for me. Anyway, we were doing a poetry segment and one of the guys in the class, not in my circle, brought in the lyric sheet from the album to read as poetry. Most of the class thought he was nuts, me too, perhaps being less open-minded then. But credit to him, and to the teacher for allowing a wide range of contributions. Somehow or other, perhaps, it fueled my coming interest in the band.

21. The Who, 905 . . . Ah, John Entwistle and his acerbic wit. About test tube babies, cloning, etc. Great stuff, from Who Are You in 1978, Keith Moon’s last album with the group.

22. Queen, Spread Your Wings . . . Not released as a single in North America, it was a top-30 hit in Europe and yet another indication of the depth of quality in most albums by the great 1960s and in Queen’s case, ’70s bands.

23. Elton John, Tell Me When The Whistle Blows . . . As I was saying about the Queen track above. Elton John was on another level in the early- to mid-1970s – and he was releasing two albums a year, as per his contract, for some of that time. One of my favorite songs by EJ, this one from Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirty Cowboy, 1975.

24. Pat Benatar, Rated X . . . A B-side on the I Need A Lover single from Benatar’s 1979 debut album In The Heat Of The Night. It was an A-side, later, in France. I’ve never understood why it’s not on any Benatar compilations. Great tune, written by Canadian Nick Gilder of Sweeney Todd and solo fame. No matter, I’ve long had the album and of course these days music is so widely available you can hear it anytime you wish.

25. Ramones, Out Of Time . . . And, I am out of time for another week. The Ramones’ version of the Rolling Stones’ tune which features one of my favorite lyrical put down lines in music – “you’re obsolete, my baby.” From Acid Eaters, the Ramones’ 1993 covers album of some of their favorite 1960s songs.

1. The J. Geils Band, Musta Got Lost (live, from Blow Your Face Out including Peter Wolf’s immortal intro rap) . . . The studio version was a No. 12 single in 1975 and arguably the band’s best-known song before the mass commercial success of the Freeze Frame album in 1981. But this live version is ‘the’ definitive version, thanks to lead singer Peter Wolf’s intro.

2. Roger Waters, Amused To Death (live) . . . No, not another show featuring songs from live albums. I intend to get back to that eventually, but just happened to start with a couple which I couldn’t/didn’t squeeze into the live album show of a few weeks ago. Nine-minute title cut from Waters’ 1992 album, this version taken from the In The Flesh live album, from 2000. The song title was inspired by Neil Postman’s 1985 book Amusing Ourselves To Death which had a big influence on my thinking and I highly recommend.

3. Pink Floyd, Pigs (Three Different Ones) . . . My favorite song from a personal favorite Floyd album, Animals, from 1977, a record which, to the mainstream, seems to get overlooked amid Dark Side, Wish You Were Here and The Wall. Meddle, the album before The Dark Side Of The Moon, shares that circumstance with Animals . . . Love the “You fucked up old hag…” A reference to UK morality campaigner Mary Whitehouse, who Deep Purple similarly disparaged in Mary Long from their 1973 Who Do We Think We Are album.

4. Led Zeppelin, What Is And What Should Never Be . . . I always remember when my older brother, by eight years, brought Led Zeppelin II home and, at first, being overwhelmed by the heaviness of it in contrast to the Beatles’ and Stones’ diet I had pretty much subsisted on to that point. And then being fascinated, hearing that guitar break coming out of first one speaker channel, then the other.

5. Queen, Dead On Time . . . Killer Queen rock, pun intended, from the Jazz album. Yet another great Queen track written by guitarist Brian May, who wrote so many of the great Queen tunes, hits or otherwise.

6. Black Sabbath, Heaven And Hell . . . From the terrific first Sabbath album featuring the late great Ronnie James Dio on lead vocals. I got into this album via the DJ at that bar, The Riverside in Oakville, Ontario that I often reference I worked at during college. We had live rock bands upstairs in the place, which featured a disco (we’re talking late 1970s), an acoustic downstairs cubbyhole, an outside patio (no live music) and the upstairs Boathouse as I recall it was called, where the rock bands played. Anyway, between sets we had a DJ playing stuff and Sabbath’s Heaven And Hell was one of those, along with Ted Nugent’s Double Live Gonzo, Judas Priest’s British Steel and Stained Class, and AC/DC’s Highway To Hell and Back In Black that he played the shit out of and as a result got me into those albums. Love the album cover, too, the Sabbath one, three angels smoking cigarettes. A particularly amazing album when one considers that Sabbath had just lost iconic singer Ozzy Osbourne, people wondered about the band and they responded with a stone-cold classic. Similar to what AC/DC did with Back In Black after Bon Scott died.

7. AC/DC, Problem Child . . . Kick butt rocker from the relatively early days of the band, the late Bon Scott on lead vocals. I like both versions of AC/DC but Bon’s vocals sometimes, wow. Like on this tune where, to me, like with lots of Ozzy stuff on early Sabbath albums, he, dunno how to explain it, seems to sort of come in from somewhere else, riding the opening riff and then off they all go to even greater heights. To me, this track is an example of that.

8. Deep Purple, No No No . . . From Fireball. Aside from Ian Gillan, the band members don’t seem to like this album but as a big Purple fan I think everything they’ve done, all versions of the band, is worthwhile.

9. Thin Lizzy, Opium Trail . . . I like Lizzy a lot and anyone who’s into them knows they are far more than The Boys Are Back In Town. This propulsive track is from the, to me, killer Bad Reputation (great title track I’ve played before) album, arguably a harder-rocking offering than some preceding work. Yet they released the relatively softer Dancing In The Moonlight (good song) as the lone single, backed with the title track.
   
10. The Doors, The Changeling . . . Nice bluesy track from what is perhaps my favorite Doors album, L.A. Woman.

11. The Rolling Stones, Melody . . . Essentially a duet between Mick Jagger and then Stones’ session man, keyboard player and great artist in his own right Billy Preston. From the album, Black And Blue, that Keith Richards has categorized as ‘auditioning guitar players’ from which the Stones settled on Ron Wood to replace the departed Mick Taylor. Jeff Beck, Rory Gallagher, Harvey Mandel (Canned Heat, John Mayall) and noted session player (for too many artists to count) Wayne Perkins (great solo on the album’s Hand Of Fate) auditioned. Another one of those songs that shows the Stones’ versatility and, more so perhaps, willingness to tackle any genre. The album was largely panned when it came out but, as is often the case, it’s now considered the classic we Stones fans knew it was, from the beginning.

12. Jethro Tull, Alive And Well And Living In . . . A track from the expanded re-release of the sometimes (aside from Tull fans like me) overlooked Benefit album, 1970. The song also came out on the North American CD release of the Living In The Past compilation, originally released in 1972.

13. Chicago, In The Country . . . You saw how I did that? From the Tull song title to . . . living In The Country. Ha! Anyway, another great tune from the second Chicago album, 1970. They were, to me, ridiculously good for the first three albums especially, and on until Terry Kath’s sad death at age 31 in 1978 via an unintentional self-inflicted gunshot wound.

14. The Kinks, Celluloid Heroes . . . Another late 1960s/early 1970s (this from 1972) Kinks’ song to not make the charts. Just absurd. A well-known song by the band, nevertheless, and deservedly so.

15. Rainbow, Self Portrait . . . Another nice tune featuring the lead vocals of Ronnie James Dio, this from the first Rainbow album. After two more Rainbow albums, Dio left to replace Ozzy in Black Sabbath on the Heaven And Hell album. Dio made any band he was in better. I can barely stomach the more pop-oriented Rainbow, aside from a few tracks, after Dio’s departure.

16. Blue Oyster Cult, Flaming Telepaths . . . Early Blue Oyster Cult, from Secret Treaties, their third album and last of the ‘black and white’ period of album covers. Typically spooky stuff from that period, this before the next studio album, Agents Of Fortune, which featured their deserved breakthrough hit, (Don’t Fear) The Reaper.

17. Jeff Beck, Max’s Tune . . . From Rough And Ready, from the second iteration of the Jeff Beck Group – first version with Rod Stewart and Ron Wood; second with Bobby Tench (vocals, rhythm guitar) Max Middleton (piano/keyboards) Clive Garman (bass) and Cozy Powell (drums). Also known as Raynes Park Blues. I don’t know how to describe this one, actually, mellow for the most part, jazzy. I just like it.

18. Savoy Brown, Money Can’t Save Your Soul . . . Nice bluesy track from a band I very much like and who I saw, great show, at a recent Kitchener Blues Festival.

19. ZZ Top, 2000 Blues . . . From 1990’s Recycler album which marked, somewhat, the band’s emergence from the huge hit, synthesizer-driven 1980s albums like Eliminator (Legs, etc.) and Afterburner and back to, at least on this one, the blues that was the band’s original bread and butter. Of course, they’ve been much less successful, commercially, since but I’ll just leave it at that – and I do like some of the ‘synthesizer’ stuff; good songs in there amid the murk.

20. Bruce Springsteen, Darkness On The Edge Of Town . . . Title track from the wall-to-wall quality 1978 album. As previously mentioned, I like his before and after work but my favorite albums of his remain Born To Run, this one, Darkness, and then The River. Age, time/place, whatever, to me he was at his peak musically and lyrically.

• Teenage Head, Disgusteen . . . I’ve played it long ago, just love it and a perfect opener with the “Nice day for a party, isn’t it?’ line to kick off the song. Plus, of course, the Exorcist takeoff later on. I saw the original band at a college concert way back when.

• Rush, Here Again . . . early, bluesy Rush from the debut album, with the late John Rutsey on drums, before Neil Peart arrived and the band started moving in a more progressive rock direction, musically and lyrically.

• Stampeders, Playin’ In The Band . . . This ‘only’ made No. 23 in Canada among the many great Stampeders’ singles, but it’s perhaps my favorite of their songs.

• Danko Jones, Bounce . . . Kick-butt rocker, an early tune of his and remains my favorite, perhaps because I don’t know his entire output, not a major fan but what I’ve heard I like.
• Trooper, The Boys In The Bright White Sports Car . . . Interesting, this one. It was originally on Trooper’s Two For The Show album in 1976 but didn’t become a big hit until three years later, when it was re-released as the opening cut of the ubiquitous Hot Shots compilation.
• Headstones, Judy . . . Another great raunch and roller from the outstanding debut and arguably still best album, Picture of Health. For my sister Judy. No, not really although I think of her every time I listen to it, simply due to the title, not necessarily any lyrics.
• Junkhouse, Jesus Sings The Blues . . . I’m not going to repeat my usual lines about Junkhouse, how much I like the band, how much I admire leader Tom Wilson as an artist and have followed him everywhere – solo, Blackie and The Rodeo Kings, Lee Harvey Osmond. Or how, after Junkhouse reunited a few years back to play the Kitchener Blues Festival, I ran into and had a nice chat with Wilson as we both waited in line the next morning to buy a coffee at a local joint.

• Chilliwack, 148 Heavy . . . It’s about a flight from Vancouver to Toronto, always liked this tune, a reference to an aviation term describing maximum takeoff weight assigned to an aircraft, and among my favorites by the band. They didn’t play it – it’s relatively obscure from the Breakdown In Paradise album in 1979 – during a terrific set that brought the house down at a recent Kitchener Blues Festival.

• Murray McLauchlan, Out Past The Timberline . . . Evocative lyrics from one of Canada’s master singer-songwriters. I just love this tune, it IS Canada, really, or at least part of it. I always get sort of emotional listening to it, dunno, I just do.

• BB Gabor, Big Yellow Taxi . . . What to me represents a great cover from the late great Gabor, a reinvention rather than just a pretty much note-for-note copy. And it leads into the next tune, Joni, doing Joni.

• Joni Mitchell, This Flight Tonight . . . From the classic Blue album. Nazareth, of course, turned this into a big hit with their rocked-up version which then prompted Mitchell to introduce it when she played it at her concerts as “a Nazareth song.” I like her original version, too.

• The Guess Who, Proper Stranger…One of the, to me, great Guess Who deep cuts, from the American Woman album. I often feel like I’m trotting along atop a horse, given the pace of the tune.

• Sass Jordan, Ugly . . . A nice, dirty, raunchy track from the Rats album. She’s so great, Sass, saw her on the SARS bill in 2003 along with the many acts that opened for The Rolling Stones that day. I was reading up on her where she said she was always much more influenced by great male blues/rock singers like Free/Bad Co’s Paul Rodgers than she was by female singers, and she shows those qualities here. I remember at one point in the Van Halen saga, after Sammy Hagar left for the second time, there was some talk or speculation of maybe wishful thinking from people thinking she would be a great lead vocalist for the band. Would have been interesting for sure and certainly likely would have worked better than the ill-fated Gary Cherone period. I just discovered she’s got a blues covers album out, called Rebel Moon Blues. It’s great, available on YouTube and worth checking out.

• Colin James, Hide . . . Funky, up-tempo track from the Fuse album.

• David Wilcox, Bump Up Ahead . . . Wilcox is pretty consistent, I doubt there’s a tune of his I don’t like and he’s now been around a long time. I won’t tell you in an on purpose run-on sentence about the time he played the bar I worked in during college, you know, regular readers, when he came in, I was at the door, and he asked me where the bands played and at first I thought he was a customer but he told me he was there for the sound check and later, with his trio highlighted only by a white spotlight unlike the cover bands with their often ridiculous stage setups, blew the roof off the place.

• Doug And The Slugs, Thunder Makes The Noise . . . Yet another great tune from the Cognac and Bologna album, their first (and to me best) release, 1980. And I won’t tell you my usual story about seeing them at that same bar in Oakville, Ontario (I was off duty) with my then-girlfriend who had come to love the band when she discovered them while in Vancouver for a year, so we went. And I became a fan.

• Bachman-Turner Overdrive, I Think You Better Slow Down/Slow Down Boogie . . . Nearly 10 minutes of raunch from the debut album sessions that wasn’t officially released until much later, on the BTO Anthology 2-CD compilation.

• Bruce Cockburn, What About The Bond . . . One of my favorites from the excellent Humans album, 1980.

• Neil Young, Come On Baby Let’s Go Downtown . . . Up-tempo tune, musically at least, from the downbeat, dark Tonight’s The Night album. Recorded live at the Fillmore, New York, in 1970 and released five years later on the otherwise all-studio album.

• The Tea Party, Paint It Black . . . I’ll always find a way to get a Stones’ tune in, hee hee, no matter what the possible limitations of any themed show I might be doing are. Nice cover of a great band, by a pretty decent band.

• Streetheart, Tin Soldier . . . Streetheart’s version of the Small Faces tune, released on the Drugstore Dancer album in 1980. Actually, at the time, prompted me to dig back into the Small Faces.

• April Wine, Silver Dollar . . . Among my favorite April Wine songs, dark, menacing. From First Glance, the first album of theirs aside from compilations that I actually bought, mostly for the hot single at the time, Rock N Roll Is A Vicious Game, but it’s track for track an excellent album.

• Alannah Myles, Rockinghorse . . . Title cut and, for my money, easily the best song on her second album, a good one. But this wasn’t one of the, count ’em, five singles released from the record.

• The Tragically Hip, Yawning Or Snarling . . . A brooding, hypnotic track from one of my favorite Hip albums, the darker (for them) Day For Night, 1994.

• Martha and The Muffins/M + M, Danseparc (Every Day It’s Tomorrow) . . . This was a relatively successful single, No. 31 on Canadian charts and while I rarely or try not to play singles on what’s supposed to be a deep cuts show, 30-plus years later it’s probably a deep cut and, by now, fits into my show’s title – So Old It’s New. Just love the vibe, the instrumentation, all of it. From the period of time when the band went by the M + M name.

• Steppenwolf, The Pusher . . . I suppose Steppenwolf, formed in Los Angeles, is more properly a Canadian-American band but, they did originate from the remnants of the Canadian band The Sparrows, from which Steppenwolf founders John Kay, Jerry Edmonton and Goldy McJohn came. A well-known Steppenwolf tune, the first of two penned by Hoyt Axton (the other being Snowblind Friend) that Steppenwolf popularized further. Axton’s originals are terrific, too. You don’t tend to hear The Pusher on radio much though, perhaps due to the subject matter and it wasn’t one of the singles from the debut album. I remember when it came out, I was 9 and I remember my friends and I marvelling at the fact they said ‘god damn” in a song. That was somewhat ‘way out there’ back then, at least to our young, impressionable ears.

• The Band, (I Don’t Want To) Hang Up My Rock And Roll Shoes . . . But, I must hang it up for another week, with this cover, from the Rock Of Ages live album, of a tune written by 1950s rock and rhythm and blues artist Chuck Willis, taken at the peak of his career at age 32. Perhaps best known for his No. 1 on the R &B charts hit version of C.C. Rider, Willis, a heavy drinker who suffered from stomach ulcers, died of peritonitis, an inflammation of the abdomen, during surgery in 1958.

So Old It’s New set list for Monday, June 21, 2021, airing 8-10 pm ET at Radio Waterloo. All selections are from live albums, something I did eons ago on the show and figured would be fun to reprise. Some people like live albums, some don’t, I tend to prefer studio versions in most cases but, that said, live albums are often exciting and interesting in terms of perhaps new and/or extended arrangements of familiar tunes. Which is the same as the concert experience and, as Joe Jackson (and perhaps many others) once said, if you want the note-for-note studio versions, that’s what the studio albums are for.

Amazing how many live albums I have, actually, as I discovered while going through them for tonight’s set. But, then again, I’m the type who owns pretty much everything released by artists I like, accumulated over the years. And look at the famous live albums that were on my original list of sources that I didn’t wind up using – Frampton Comes Alive!, Thin Lizzy’s Live and Dangerous, Unleashed In The East by Judas Priest, Ted Nugent’s Double Live Gonzo!, Allman Brothers At Fillmore East (because I played In Memory Of Elizabeth Reed from that album last week), Genesis Seconds Out, on and on . . All of which means I’ll likely do a volume 2 and 3 and on of this theme in future shows. Next week, though, it’s likely an all-Canadian show in advance of Canada Day. Then maybe back to live stuff or, we’ll see. Anyway, off we go . . .

1. Bob Seger & The Silver Bullet Band, Let It Rock (from Live Bullet) …This album, along with Night Moves and that album’s title cut, are what broke Seger big into the wider public consciousness. This Chuck Berry cover actually closed the Cobo Hall show from which Live Bullet is drawn, but I figured it would be a good opener for tonight’s show, which I’m starting with a series of old rock and roll classics covered by some of the big rock acts these tunes originally inspired.

2. The Rolling Stones, Around and Around (from Love You Live) . . . Smokin’ version from the El Mocambo side of what was originally a 2-record vinyl release.

3. Johnny and Edgar Winter, Rock & Roll Medley – Slippin’ and Slidin’; Jailhouse Rock; Tutti-Frutti; Sick and Tired; I’m Ready; Reelin’ and Rockin’; Blue Suede Shoes; Jenny Take A Ride; Good Golly Miss Molly (from Together) . . . Little snippets of each track, put together by the Winter brothers to form a great 6-minute medley.

4. Jimi Hendrix, Johnny B. Goode (from Hendrix In The West) . . . Absolutely blistering version of what George Thorogood once called, on one of his live albums, ‘the rock and roll national anthem’. In The West, which my late older brother had on vinyl (he was my intro to Hendrix), is a selection of live tracks largely pulled from Hendrix shows in San Diego and the San Francisco area between 1968 and 1970. This take on yet another Chuck Berry classic is from a show at the Berkeley Community Center on May 30, 1970.

5. Mountain, Roll Over Beethoven (edit from Dream Sequence, Flowers Of Evil album) . . . Flowers of Evil is split into studio and live sides, with Roll Over Beethoven pulled from within the 25-minute Dream Sequence, recorded in June, 1971 at New York’s Fillmore East.

6. The Who, Shakin’ All Over (from Live At Leeds) . . . Great Who take on the Johnny Kidd & The Pirates classic.

7. Santana, Dance Sister Dance (from Moonflower) . . . Santana’s in full flight on this one, a case in my view where a live version is better than the studio take, which is on the Amigos album.

    

8. Bruce Springsteen, Because The Night (from Live 1975-85 box set) . . . A tune co-written by Springsteen and Patti Smith, whose version, from the Easter album, I’ve previously played on my show. To my knowledge/research, Springsteen has never released a studio version of it as he apparently never thought it was up to snuff, to the consternation of his band mates, who thought otherwise. But, he’s played it live over the years and included this live version, from Long Island’s Nassau Coliseum in 1980, on the live boxed set.

9. The Butterfield Blues Band, The Boxer (from The Butterfield Blues Band Live) . . . Love this up-tempo boogie-type blues from this horn-drenched version of the Butterfield band. Not the Simon and Garfunkel tune.

10. Eric Clapton, Presence Of The Lord (from E.C. Was Here) . . . Yvonne Elliman, who was such a big part of Clapton’s ’70s albums, helps out on vocals on this somewhat rearranged version of the tune that first was heard on the one and only Blind Faith studio album. Different guitar solo than the amazing one on the studio version but great in its own way.

11. Muddy Waters, Deep Down In Florida (from Muddy “Mississippi’ Waters Live) . . . Johnny Winter, who produced and played on a string of Muddy’s albums in the late 1970s, accompanied Waters on the tour for Hard Again, which featured this typical slow blues, my favorite kind.

12. Stephen Stills, Jet Set (Sigh)/Rocky Mountain Way/Jet Set (Sigh) (from Stephen Stills Live) . . . Interesting, perhaps, that I came somewhat late to Stills’ solo work, aside from Love The One You’re With, despite liking Buffalo Springfield, Crosby, Stills & Nash and Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. But unlike with Neil Young, I never deeply followed Stills’ solo career. That is, until I heard Tree Top Flyer (which I’ve played on the show) from his brilliant Stills Alone album some years ago. That sent me back into his catalog and here we are. Nice combo version of his own Jet Set (Sigh) and Joe Walsh/Barnstorm’s Rocky Mountain Way.

13. Beck, Bogert, Appice, Black Cat Moan (from Live In Japan) . . . Big use of the ‘talk box’ guitar effects unit that was something of a ‘thing’ back in the 1970s and used also by Peter Frampton on the Frampton Comes Alive album. Beck handles lead vocals himself on this Don Nix cover. I don’t own the album, which is available on YouTube but was released only in Japan in 1974. I pulled this one from my copy of the Beckology box set.

14. Grand Funk Railroad, Paranoid (from Live: The 1971 Tour) . . . Not the Black Sabbath tune. This is Grand Funk’s own riff-rocker, and a fine one it is.

15. Roy Buchanan, Down By The River (from Sweet Dreams: The Anthology, previously unreleased live version) . . . Crazy good guitar by the late great Buchanan on this cover of the Neil Young tune. Lead vocals by Billy Price, who collaborated with Buchanan in the mid-1970s.

16. Van Morrison, I’ve Been Working (from It’s Too Late To Stop Now) . . . Well, I really haven’t been. This isn’t working, it’s fun putting together these shows. Often takes me on my own rediscovery trips through my music collection, like this up tempo tune from Van The Man’s 1974 live release. This is from the original album. An expanded, different version, called Volumes II, III and IV and also featuring a DVD of a show from that period, was released in 2016. It’s great, all of it.

17. Roxy Music, Out Of The Blue (from Viva!) . . . This song, originally on the Country Life studio album, seems to bubble up from underground, is how I’d describe it. Or, I could just say, it’s great. Creativity to me is endlessly fascinating in a ‘how did they think of that, where do they find these arrangements?’ kind of way.

     

18. Faces, (I Know) I’m Losing You (Live at the BBC, 1971, from Five Guys Walk Into A Bar box set) . . . Crackling version of such a great song originally taken to No. 1 by The Temptations. Besides his dirty guitar, love Ronnie Wood’s ‘yeah’ just before Rod Stewart kicks in with the lead vocal. Oh, and a nice drum solo by Kenney Jones, too. What a great band Faces were. And they backed Stewart on the studio version he released on Every Picture Tells A Story.

19. Blue Oyster Cult, We Gotta Get Out Of This Place (from Some Enchanted Evening) . . . And we’re outta here for another week with BOC’s cover of a song, written by the husband-wife team of Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, likely best known via The Animals’ version.

1. The Rolling Stones, Oh No Not You Again . . . Oh yes, I’m back with another show, with this opening rocker from the most recent studio album of original material by the Stones, A Bigger Bang in 2005. Originally, there was talk of this being the title of the album. I think they should have gone with it, but too late now. Speaking of late, or overdue, as a Stones’ fan, I just wish they’d release some new material. They keep talking about it, but all we’ve seen since is the blues cover album, Blue and Lonesome, in 2016. A fine record but I want some original, new, studio stuff!

2. Booker T. and The MGs, Melting Pot . . . Some great, extended sould/funk/R & B from the band best known for Green Onions although they have so many great tunes.

3. Little Feat, Let It Roll . . . Up-tempo title cut from the band’s 1988 album, the first one without founding member and chief songwriter Lowell George, who died in 1979. Like so many veteran bands, they’re still around, with various replacement members, carrying on even after the death in 2019 of guitarist/singer Paul Barrere, who joined Little Feat for their third album, Dixie Chicken, in 1973 and essentially assumed leadership of the reformed group after George’s passing. I saw them in 2004 in a club in Hamilton, Ont. Great show.

4. UFO, Love Lost Love . . . Typically great guitar from Michael Schenker on this one from 1975’s Force It album.

5. Ancient Relic, Via Maris … Another Iron Maiden-like track from Toronto artist/one-man band Jesse Feyen. Jesse contacted me some months ago to see whether I’d play some of his stuff which he figured fit into the type of material I play. And I do occasionally play metal, his stuff is Maiden-influenced so, why not? He’s working on an album and for now, his stuff is available on You Tube.

6. James Gang, The Bomber … I’ve played a few Eagles’ tunes on the show in recent weeks,which got me thinking of Joe Walsh and the James Gang. This extended piece, great stuff, is from Rides Again, the band’s second album, in 1970.

7. Chicago, Fancy Colours . . . I’ve always loved this tune, from the second album. Some have suggested it’s about a drug trip, who knows, who cares. Great guitar as always, including wah-wah, by Terry Kath. I remember getting this album via the Columbia Record Club my older brother and sister joined way back then, 1970, which led us to Chicago and other Columbia acts at the time, including Blood, Sweat & Tears and Santana.

8. Marianne Faithfull, Sister Morphine (12” version, 1979) . . . Co-written by Faithfull with Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, it was originally released by Faithfull in 1969 and featured Jagger on acoustic guitar, Ry Cooder on slide guitar and bass and Charlie Watts on drums. The Stones released their own version, with slightly different lyrics and also featuring Cooder, in 1971 on the Sticky Fingers album. This version is from 1979, when Faithfull re-recorded it for her great comeback album, Broken English. It wasn’t on the original album but was released as 7- and 12-inch singles as the flip side to the song Broken English. It later came out on an expanded 2-CD re-release of the Broken English album and is available on some compilations, and online. Harrowing stuff, every version.

9. John Lennon, Working Class Hero . . . From Plastic Ono Band, Lennon’s 1970 album which contains two songs, this one and Oh God, whose lyrics were hugely influential on my young, developing mind.

10. Blind Faith, Sea Of Joy . . . Not a bad song on the one and only Blind Faith studio album. Sort of a combination of Cream (Eric Clapton and Ginger Baker), Traffic (Steve Winwood) and Family (Ric Grech). The result? A fabulous album I never tire of.

11. David Wilcox, Somethin’s Shakin’ . . . Great tune from this outstanding Canadian artist who, repeating myself as I do every time I play him, I first saw while working as a doorman at a bar in Oakville, Ont., putting myself through college in the late 1970s. In walks Wilcox a few hours before he was on, just a regular guy in street clothes, asking me where the bands played as he was in for a sound check. And, later that night, still in those regular streets clothes, just a white spotlight as stage lighting for his trio, blew the roof off the joint.

12. Garland Jeffreys, True Confessions . . . I bought 1981’s Escape Artist album for his cover of ? And The Mysterians’ 96 Tears and became a fan. Love when that happens. Some real heavyweights on the album including Springsteen’s E Street Band members Roy Bittan and the late Danny Federici.

13. T-Bone Burnett, Primitives . . . Spooky track by Burnett, well-known as a producer with too many great album credits to count, Burnett first came to prominence as a member of Bob Dylan’s band during the 1970s. His resume is pretty much mind-blowing given his own music, production credits,music for film and TV. Just a brilliant artist.

14. Carlos Santana and Buddy Miles, Marbles (live) . . . Blazing instrumental, a John McLaughlin tune released on the 1972 live album by Santana and Miles. It was recorded inside the Diamond Head volcano in Hawaii, which was a ‘thing’ bands did during the 1970s in collaboration with local artists, until the state canceled the deal due to noise and environmental impact concerns.

15. The J. Geils Band, Detroit Breakdown . . . Got talking about The Who (they’re coming up later in the set) with some friends this week, concerts we had seen and who opened. One friend saw J. Geils (and Heart) open for The Who back in 1980 so the great blues-rock outfit Geils came to mind. Fantastic live outfit, this is the studio version. It might be the first time I’ve played a studio version of one of their songs on the show, actually, their live versions are so terrific. But so is the studio stuff.

16. Talking Heads, The Overload . . . One of my younger brothers thought I had become a stoner when he heard me listening to this droning track from 1980’s Remain In Light. Well, I was experimenting a bit at the time.

17. Bruce Cockburn, Radium Rain . . . Extended, self-explanatory piece from Cockburn’s 1986 Big Circumstance album, when things like acid rain were a hot topic. Whatever happened to that, anyway? Well, general talk about climate change is more widespread and acid rain itself, yes I looked this up, does not have as big an impact these days as it did in the 1970s and 80s, due to stronger air pollution regulations.

18. Warren Zevon, Veracruz . . . I’ve always loved this track from Excitable Boy, great ballad about the battle for the city, between the United States and Mexico in 1914.

19. Screaming Trees, Who Lies In Darkness . . . Just saw this one lying around in the station computer system, from a previous download of mine, and decided to play it. From one of the Seattle grunge bands like Nirvana, Pearl Jam, Soundgarden and Alice In Chains which shook up the music world in the early 1990s.

20. The Who, Music Must Change . . . I told you, a few songs ago, that I’d get to The Who in the show. This is a great one from 1978’s Who Are You album, drummer Keith Moon’s swan song. Love the coin drop intro.

21. Led Zeppelin, Night Flight . . . So much great stuff on Physical Graffiti, can’t go wrong picking any song for the show but I do have to fly out of here soon so perhaps that’s why, subconsciously, went with this one and placed it here, near the end of the set.

22. The Allman Brothers Band, In Memory Of Elizabeth Reed (live) . . . Typically great Allmans instrumental, one of their best. This version is from At Fillmore East, widely acknowledged as one of rock’s greatest live albums. Written by guitarist Dickey Betts, it’s about a woman he was involved with but Elizabeth Reed wasn’t her name; Betts took it from the name on a headstone in Macon, Georgia, where the band was largely based after forming in Jacksonville, Florida.

23. Badfinger, It’s Over . . . And so it is, for another week. Great tune by the first band to be signed to The Beatles’ Apple Records. They had a string of hits in the early 1970s – Come And Get It (written and produced by Paul McCartney); No Matter What (produced by Beatles’ personal assistant Mal Evans); Day After Day (produced by George Harrison) and Baby Blue (produced by Todd Rundgren).

1. Atomic Rooster, Head In The Sky . . . Up tempo tune from the UK progressive rock band originally formed by  Crazy World Of Arthur Brown alumni Vincent Crane and Carl Palmer, the drummer who is not featured on this track from the third album, In Hearing Of Atomic Rooster. Palmer had departed by then to join Emerson, Lake & Palmer.

2. Romantics, Rock You Up . . . I dug this one up while sorting my CDs, another band from my college days. Perhaps best known for their first hit, What I Like About You, in 1980, they released this track in 1983. It was the second single from the In Heat album, which yielded the top 5 single Talking In Your Sleep.

3. The Rolling Stones, Stray Cat Blues . . . One of my favorite Stones’ tunes, for the lascivious opening alone but just a great track throughout. I was undecided as to whether to play this or Sister Morphine, from Sticky Fingers (perhaps next week; I always play a song from my favorite band). So I ran it by a buddy of mine and, not surprisingly since he loves the Beggars Banquet album, he suggested I go with Stray Cat.

4. Bruce Springsteen, Candy’s Room . . . I’ve been in a Springsteen phase of late. This great rocker comes from the brilliant Darkness On The Edge Of Town album, so good it could be a greatest hits album.

5. Collective Soul, Love Lifted Me . . . I’ve loved this Georgia band’s sound, gritty, grungy guitars, since their debut album Hints, Allegations and Things Left Unsaid in 1993. Like most people, perhaps, got into them via their debut No. 1 single, Shine, from that album. Love Lifted Me is a nice deep cut from the same record, up tempo, typically hypnotic Collective Soul riff.

6. Eagles, The Greeks Don’t Want No Freaks . . . Fun little ditty from The Long Run, the followup to the monster Hotel California album which, to me, gets unfairly panned. I think it’s a terrific album, The Long Run, full of great songs and what do the rock critics know, anyway? Sales aren’t necessarily the barometer of great art, but it’s a great album and has sold more than eight million copies in the USA alone.

7. Elton John, Madman Across The Water . . . I love this somewhat spooky title track from EJ’s 1971 album. It was originally scheduled for the previous album, Tumbleweed Connection, but was held back and came out as the title cut to the next record. I didn’t know this until a while ago but apparently when it came out, some thought the lyrics were about then-US President Richard Nixon and maybe they were, although lyricist Bernie Taupin said no: “I thought, that is genius. I could never have thought of that.” I never thought of it, either, and reading the lyrics well, maybe, but, doubtful, to me. It matters not. Great song.

8. Carole King, Smackwater Jack . . . I mentioned earlier in the set how Springsteen’s Darkness On The Edge Of Town could be a greatest hits album. If any album could be seen that way, it’s King’s Tapestry, from which I pulled this relative deep cut. What a ridiculously great album Tapestry is.

9. Headstones, Leave It All Behind . . . Active from their great debut, Picture Of Health in 1993 until 2003, these hard-rocking Canadian boys got back together in 2011 and picked up as if they never left. This typical blistering track is from their most recent release, 2019’s PeopleSkills.

10. AC/DC, Burnin’ Alive . . . Great, slow-building track from the, I think, underappreciated Ballbreaker album in 1995. AC/DC generally isn’t a political band in terms of lyrics, but there are various theories as to what this one’s about. Many think it’s about the Waco, Texas siege in 1993 and I tend to subscribe to that notion, but I just read another view, that it could be about Centralia, Pennsylvania, where a coal mine fire has been burning beneath the almost-completely abandoned town since 1962. That’s a fascinating story in itself, well worth researching.

11. Creedence Clearwater Revival, Graveyard Train . . . CCR has so many great singles but when you dig deeper they are so much more in terms of album tracks, including this extended, hypnotic, bluesy excursion from Bayou Country, 1969.

12. Janis Joplin, Mercedes Benz . . . Fun little tune from Joplin’s last, posthumously-released album, Pearl. This was the last song she ever recorded. Love her spoken word intro, and cackle at the end.
    
13. John Lee Hooker, John L’s House Rent Boogie (1950 version) . . . George Thorogood later famously took this tune and combined it with the next one I’m playing by Hooker, into his own extended version of One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer that appeared on Thorogood’s 1977 debut album. Great blues by an original master, Hooker.

14. John Lee Hooker, One Bourbon, One Scotch, One Beer . . . From Hooker’s 1966 release, The Real Folk Blues. Great stuff.
    
15. Bobbie Gentry, Mississippi Delta . . . Best known for her 1967 smash Ode To Billie Joe, Gentry has many great tunes and was one of the first female artists to compose and produce her own material. This great track featuring Gentry’s gritty vocals, different than her singing on Ode To Billie Joe, was the B-side to that hit and then later released as a single on its own. In Japan, Mississippi Delta was the A-side and Billie Joe the flip.
    
16. John Cougar Mellencamp, You’ve Got To Stand For Somethin’ . . . Love this tune, good lyrics, from the standout Scarecrow album. Not a bad song on it.
    
17. Peter Tosh, Downpressor Man . . . Somewhat all over the map on today’s show, accidentally on purpose I suppose. Part of the creative fun. So, here we go with some reggae from the late great Tosh. I got into him way back, sort of via Bob Marley who, perhaps like many, I was introduced to via Eric Clapton’s version of I Shot The Sheriff in 1974. After that, it seemed all the big rock acts starting delving into reggae, at least a bit, including The Rolling Stones, who signed Tosh to their Rolling Stones Records label and with whom Mick Jagger did the hit duet (You Gotta Walk) Don’t Look Back on Tosh’s Bush Doctor album in 1978. But by that time, I was already well into Tosh via albums/songs like Legalize It – which I’ve played before on the show and almost certainly will again. Great artists, both he and Marley.

18. The Moody Blues, Melancholy Man . . . Another sort of random selection I came across while loading tracks into the station’s computer system. I threw this one into the system some time back, saw it, realized I had not played the Moodies in some time so, no time like the present. Beautiful, somewhat sad lyrically, tune from A Question Of Balance, in 1970.

19. Bob Dylan, Man In The Long Black Coat . . . 1989 was a pretty good year for veteran acts in terms of albums released. Eric Clapton’s Journeyman, Neil Young’s Freedom and The Rolling Stones’ Steel Wheels are among the notable ones I like. And Oh Mercy, from Dylan from which I pulled this great track, one of my all-time favorites from him.

21. Cowboy Junkies, Southern Rain . . . Wonderful up-tempo track featuring the ethereal vocals of Margo Timmins. Just an amazing singer, great band I saw at a recent Kitchener Blues Festival.
22. Dishwalla, Moisture . . . Great tune that starts slow, almost electronic, then rocks out. It’s from the band that gave us the 1996 hit Counting Blue Cars, from the same album I pulled this one from, Pet Your Friends. One of those albums you buy (or at least did, back then) for the hit single and then are rewarded by the depth of quality on the record.

22. U2, Numb . . . This was the first single from the somewhat experimental album, Zooropa, produced in part by Brian Eno, who had done similar pushing-the-envelope work with David Bowie during the latter’s Berlin period in the late 1970s. The spoken-word, droning vocals are by guitarist The Edge on a track that was a leftover from the previous album, Achtung Baby.

23. Elvis Costello, Green Shirt . . . From the Armed Forces album in 1979, it wasn’t released as a single until 1985 on a compilation. It got to No. 68 in the UK. Nice tune, perhaps somewhat unknown and underappreciated.

24. Pearl Jam, Nothing As It Seems . . . I was really into Pearl Jam’s first two albums but I confess they’ve lost me as time passes, nothing compelling enough to prompt me to purchase or listen to any of their more recent releases. Out of loyalty, I kept up until a few years ago but decided time is too precious than to keep trying to like stuff I just can’t get into even after repeated listens, although I certainly don’t begrudge the band’s dedicated, loyal and passionate fan base. That said, I just checked out a few tracks from their most recent release, Gigaton, and, not bad. So maybe worth a revisit of the most recent stuff. Until then, I’m left with the first two albums and a fine 2-CD compilation, from which I pulled this great single from the Binaural album in 2000.

25. Paul McCartney/Wings, Name And Address . . . Nice boogie/rockabilly type shuffle from London Town in 1978. McCartney, like most great artists, has so many lesser-known gems.

26. Pink Floyd, Summer ’68 . . . From Atom Heart Mother, the album with the cow on the cover. One of the few Floyd tracks written and sung by the late keyboardist Richard Wright, it’s a catchy pop tune, apparently about an encounter Wright had with a groupie in 1968.

27. Bad Company, Passing Time . . . A jaunty little tune from Bad Co’s Burnin’ Sky album, 1977. There’s not a bad tune, really, by this band – when fronted by Paul Rodgers. I can do without the Brian Howe version of the band, except for the Holy Water single. Too overproduced, 80s-type sound for me, other than that tune. I will say they did a non-Rodgers album, Company Of Strangers, in 1995 with Robert Hart on lead vocals, that I like because it harkens back to the Rodgers-era sound and Hart sounds much like Rodgers, to me. I played the title cut from the album ages ago on the show and now that I’m talking to myself about it, I will revisit. The prime stuff is, of course, the Rodgers era but Company Of Strangers is pretty good. So why didn’t I play it today? Well, I didn’t think of it until I started rambling on about it here.

28. Doug And The Slugs, Drifting Away . . . And so we drift away for another week, taking our leave with this breakup song by Doug And The Slugs, one of my favorites by that band. I was inspired to play them by a friend who texted me about some foible he saw in policy from Ontario Premier Doug Ford’s government, referring to him and his government as Doug and the slugs.