Category: playlist

With the 2015 edition of the Eclectic Playlist Series in full swing, I thought I may as well review the concept here, for anyone who’s more recently been stopping by to listen.

Each month the Eclectic Playlist Series features a mix of 20 songs, which are purposefully blended to encompass music from at least six decades (typically the ’60 through the ’10s but as you’ll see this week, earlier is definitely possible). Along the way, a variety of rock’n’roll genres and sub-genres are visited; you’ll get your share of R&B and/or soul here too, along with the occasional foray into international pop, jazz, blues, and any other type of music that just happens to work in any given mix.

An important self-imposed restriction impacts these playlists: I will not feature one artist more than once during a calendar year (although I should note it’s happened by mistake once; oops). As of now no artists has been featured more than four times even as we have moved into year five. In this month’s playlist, only five of the 20 artists have been previously featured on EPS mixes.

Bonus notes and observations for April:

* Levon and the Hawks are, essentially, The Band–this was one of the names they used after they quit their gig as Ronnie Hawkins’ backing band but before they became Bob Dylan’s backing band and then sequestered themselves in that big pink house with Dylan and emerged on the other side, once and for all, as The Band. This early single, though, has some rough signs of later greatness, and is just kind of fun to hear.

* Nearly two years after its release, I’m still slowly making sense of the moody but accomplished Radiohead album A Moon Shaped Pool. During a recent listen, “Present Tense” kind of jumped out at me, after my not much noticing it in the past.

* It’s easy to forget what beautiful, effortless-sounding songs James Taylor wrote back in the day. This one, from his Apple Records debut, which didn’t sell at all, quite obviously made an impact on George Harrison, who sang a bit of uncredited backing vocals on the album.

* It’s interesting how new-wave-y 10,000 Maniacs sound on this song. But hey they did form way back in 1981. And while most of their early stuff veered more towards R.E.M.-like proto-alternative/college rock, this one tells me how much they probably listened to U2’s Boy when it came out.

* And speaking, sort of, of new-wave-y things, how about this unexpectedly cool cover of a Chuck Berry song from England’s Ian Gomm, who is known, if at all, for the 1979 single “Hold On,” which somehow cracked the top 15 here in the U.S. that new-wave-y summer. The Berry cover comes from Gomm’s debut album, which came out in the U.K. in 1978 as Summer Holiday, but was slightly fiddled with and retitled Gomm With the Wind for U.S. release in 1979. Bonus trivia: Gomm was a guitarist in the legendary pub rock band Brinsley Schwarz, alongside Nick Lowe, with whom he co-wrote Lowe’s own top-15 U.S. hit, “Cruel To Be Kind.”

Full playlist below the widget.

“The Stone I Throw (Will Free All Men)” – Levon and the Hawks (single, 1965)
“Kick Me Where It Hurts” – The Booze (At Maximum Volume, 2011)
“Misty Blue” – Dorothy Moore (1976)
“Bachelor Kisses” – The Go-Betweens (Spring Hill Fair, 1984)
“¡Que Lleva!” – Juana Molina (Segundo, 2000)
“Lotta Love to Give” – Daniel Lanois (For the Beauty of Wynona, 1993)
“Whenever, Wherever” – Minnie Riperton (Come To My Garden, 1970)
“Present Tense” – Radiohead (A Moon Shaped Pool, 2016)
“Brite Side” – Deborah Harry (Def, Dumb & Blonde, 1991)
“Black Coffee” – Sarah Vaughan (single, 1949)
“Something in the Way She Moves” – James Taylor (James Taylor, 1968)
“Pattern Pieces” – Dive Index (Lost in the Pressure, 2014)
“My Mother The War” – 10,000 Maniacs (The Wishing Chair, 1985)
“Just Because” – Lloyd Price (single 1956)
“Gotta Get Up” – Harry Nilsson (Nilsson Schmilsson, 1971)
“In California” – Neko Case (Canadian Amp, 2001)
“I’ll Bet You” – Funkadelic (Funkadelic, 1969)
“Bedsitter” – Soft Cell (Non-Stop Erotic Cabaret, 1982)
“Come On” – Ian Gomm (Summer Holiday, 1978)
“The Bike Song” – Kate & Anna McGarrigle (Matapedia, 1996)

Spring is here so of course it’s snowing like Narnia. It’s been that kind of year. But the more I dive into the music, the more I root around, pick up a little of this and a little of that, the more I figure out (usually by accident) that these two songs sound pretty good together, and then this next one too–well, the more I do this, the calmer I get. There’s hope buried in here somewhere. Obscure Northern Soul singles are good, and so are big Madonna hits (sometimes) and semi-forgotten Grateful Dead album tracks and extended drone-y 21st-century electronic tracks with indomitable melodies, and so is Joni with her special chords and so is the first track we ever heard from Fountains of Wayne and so is a dollop of yé-yé to finish us up this time. RIP France Gall, who died in January. The young grow old, the old pass on, the music remains, and maybe that’s where the hope is buried. Don’t let them tell you that guitars are through, don’t let the people who bend over backwards to find art in interchangeable pop radio fodder hypnotize you into overlooking the actual artistry of songwriters who sing and singers who write songs and melodies that nourish you even when it’s the first day of spring and there’s still this shoveling to do.

Full playlist below the widget.

“Information” – Dave Edmunds (Information, 1983)
“Hurt the One You Love” – David Ruffin (single, 1990)
“Bitchenostrophy” – Rickie Lee Jones (The Evening Of My Best Day, 2000)
“Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde” – Ezra Furman (The Year of No Returning, 2012)
“Hope You’re Feeling Better” – Santana (Abraxas, 1970)
“Blue Rondo á la Turk” – The Dave Brubeck Quartet (Time Out, 1959)
“Live To Tell” – Madonna (True Blue, 1986)
“Only Shallow” – My Bloody Valentine (Loveless, 1991)
“Doctor Blind” – Emily Haines & The Soft Skeleton (Knives Don’t Have Your Back, 2006)
“Remember Russia” – Fischer-Z (Word Salad, 1979)
“Compared to What” – Roberta Flack (First Take, 1969)
“Carlo What Do You Dream” – James Irwin (Shabbytown, 2017)
“Victoria’s Secret” – Lisa Germano (Excerpts From a Love Circus, 1999)
“Skin Deep” – The Stranglers (Aural Sculpture, 1984)
“See You Sometime” – Joni Mitchell (For the Roses, 1972)
“One of Us Should Go” – Heidi Gluck (The Only Girl in the Room, 2014)
“Radiation Vibe” – Fountains of Wayne (Fountains of Wayne, 1996)
“Keep It Clean” – Camera Obscura (Underachievers Please Try Harder, 2003)
“Estimated Prophet” – Grateful Dead (Terrapin Station, 1977)
“Nous Ne Sommes Pas Des Anges” – France Gall (single, 1965)

“I hate and I love. How do I do that, perhaps you ask?
I don’t know. But I feel it is happening and I am tormented.”

Those are what the words in the first song mean, translated from the Latin. They were written in the first century B.C. Here they are being sung by a computerized voice. It’s a piece by the Icelandic composer Jóhann Jóhannson, who, sadly, died this month at the age of 48. I have not heard too much of his music but did stumble on this one back in 2006 and featured it here. It’s odd but compelling, and enduring; I urge you to listen with full attention.

From there, we’re off into another irregular journey through the decades. I’ve branched back into the ’50s this time, twice for good measure, and for whatever reason cleared out a little bit of an instrumental section in the middle. It just seemed to want to work out that way.

Random notes:

* Another song I urge your attention onto is “Muddy River,” from Shelley Short’s sadly overlooked 2017 release Pacific City. What a beautiful and powerful collection of acoustic songs; you can listen to it and buy it via Bandcamp.

* There’s actually one more “memorial” song in the mix: the very satisfying if semi-forgotten R&B hit “Don’t Look Any Further,” to honor Dennis Edwards, one-time front man of the Temptations, who also died this month. The song has not only an incisive, melodic bass line, but a surprisingly effective off-the-beat synth motif threading through. Props too to Siedah Garrett, who sings here with Edwards.

* I just stumbled upon the band Scars recently, and enjoy the authentic mid-new-wave vibe of “All About You.” Their album is somewhat hard to find (it’s not seemingly digitized), but I’m going to see if I can track it down, short of paying $35 for used vinyl.

* Favorite segue this time around probably goes to Johnny Cash into the Casket Girls, with R.E.M. into Elbow as honorable mention, if you’re keeping score at home. And note that while I never completely took to the Bill-Berry-less version of R.E.M., I find “Walk Unafraid” to be one of a handful of classic songs they managed without him.

Full playlist below the widget.

“Odi Et Amo” – Jóhann Jóhannson (Englabörn, 2002)
“Chequered Love” – Kim Wilde (Kim Wilde, 1981)
“She Came Along To Me” – Billy Bragg & Wilco (Mermaid Avenue, 1998)
“I Still Miss Someone” – Johnny Cash (The Fabulous Johnny Cash, 1958)
“24 Hours” – Casket Girls (The Night Machines, 2016)
“Don’t Look Any Further” – Dennis Edwards (single, 1984)
“Muddy River” – Shelley Short (Pacific City, 2017)
“American Garage” – Pat Metheny Group (American Garage, 1979)
“Baby That’s Me” – The Cake (The Cake, 1967)
“Days of Steam” – John Cale (The Academy in Peril, 1972)
“Penthouse Mambo” – Xavier Cugat (Bread, Love and Cha Cha Cha, 1957)
“Swapping Spit” – Big Deal (June Gloom, 2013)
“What Do You Think?” – The Sundays (Blind, 1992)
“You Keep Running Away” – The Four Tops (single, 1967)
“Portions for Foxes” – Rilo Kiley (More Adventurous, 2004)
“The Holdup” – David Bromberg (David Bromberg, 1971)
“All About You” – Scars (Author! Author!, 1981)
“Moonshine Freeze” – This is the Kit (Moonshine Freeze, 2017)
“Walk Unafraid” – R.E.M. (Up, 1998)
“Weather to Fly” – Elbow (The Seldom Seen Kid, 2008)

So it’s been two years now since David Bowie died. Is this even possible? January brings the man inevitably to mind, this time via an incredible cover of a song that was never previously a particular favorite of mine. But boy does Jesca Hoop give herself over to “John I’m Only Dancing,” doing what any great cover should do: opening the ears to a song’s true power. It is no accident that I selected a female vocalist covering a Bowie song, and no accident that this month’s playlist is dominated by female performances. Keep it up out there.

Meanwhile, the Eclectic Playlist Series this month enters its fifth iteration. In January, I reset the accounts, and all artists become available again. (For newcomers: no artist appears more than once a year here.) Even so, I’m happy to report that 15 out of 20 artists on this month’s list have never been on one of my playlists before, including, inexplicably, John Vanderslice, who has otherwise a strong history as a Fingertips favorite, and Lou Reed, who has an inimitable presence in rock’n’roll history.

Random notes:

* Rita Wright is more authentically identified as Syreeta Wright, but this was her first single, and that’s the name she was given for it by Motown chairman Berry Gordy. She was an early collaborator with Stevie Wonder, co-writing many songs, and singing on his albums. They were married in 1970; it only lasted a few years, but they continued to work together into the ’90s. She recorded eight solo albums in the ’70s and ’80s. Wright died at age 58, in 2004, from complications stemming from a long battle with cancer.

* Thanks to the always enjoyable radio show/podcast “The Many Moods of Ben Vaughn” for the classic Serge Gainsbourg song, which some part of me knew from a buried and mysterious point in the past but I’d never have recovered otherwise.

* I don’t think Britta Phillips got enough attention for her wonderful Luck or Magic album from 2016, the first solo release of her acclaimed career (Luna, Dean & Britta). Pitchfork among other places took her to task for the album’s having five cover songs out of 10 tracks, which strikes me as a stupid critique of someone with such a strong interpretive flair. (And never mind the fact that so many of today’s revered pop performers don’t write their songs in the first place.) The album casts a spell; I recommend it.

Full playlist below the widget.

“Trick of the Light” – Matthew Sweet (Tomorrow Forever, 2017)
“Who Do You Love” – Pointer Sisters (Priority, 1979)
“Whirlwind” – Sam Rivers (Inspiration, 1999)
“Keep It Tight” – Single Bullet Theory (Sharp Cuts: New Music From American Bands, 1980)
“Arrow” – Beaches (Second of Spring, 2017)
“La Chanson De Prévert” – Serge Gainsbourg (L’Étonnant Serge Gainsbourg, 1961)
“Crazy Feeling” – Lou Reed (Coney Island Baby, 1976)
“John I’m Only Dancing” – Jesca Hoop (A Salute to the Thin White Duke, 2015)
“Stranger Than You” – Joe Jackson (Night and Day II, 2000)
“We’re Gonna Hate Ourselves in the Morning” – Nursery Rhymes (single, 1967)
“Same Old Scene” – Roxy Music (Flesh + Blood, 1980)
“Diving Woman” – Japanese Breakfast (Soft Sounds From Another Planet, 2017)
“White Plains” – John Vanderslice (Cellar Door, 2004)
“I Can’t Give Back The Love I Feel For You” – Rita Wright (single, 1968)
“Never Go Back” – Christine Lavin (Good Thing He Can’t Read My Mind, 1987)
“Nothing Has Been Proved” – Dusty Springfield (Reputation, 1990)
“Fallin’ in Love” – Britta Phillips (Luck or Magic, 2016)
“Forget About You” – The Motors (Approved By The Motors, 1978)
“The Storm” – The Hunters (single, 1962)
“Attagirl” – Bettie Serveert (Attagirl, 2004)

Perhaps the least cool band that can possibly be imagined to 2017 ears, the British outfit Renaissance had its moment in the ’70s, with a distinctive, quasi-Baroque approach to the progressive rock that ruled the pre-punk day. Once musical fashions changed, rather abruptly I might add, Renaissance, like prog-rock compatriots Yes and Genesis, attempted to re-jigger their approach towards trimmer, catchier exercises. Because the underlying musicianship was so strong for most of these bands, some of this actually worked, and to me, few better than “Northern Lights.” The melodies here are so unfaltering as to seem pre-existing—verse leading unstoppably to chorus, chorus resplendent beyond reason. It became a top-10 hit in the U.K., and got a certain amount of play on the album-rock stations that ruled the American airwaves in those years, but lord knows if any but the band’s stalwart fans remember it. Such treasures await anyone willing to dig through the past 60 years of popular and semi-popular music. Spotify just can’t find them all for you.

What else this month? I guess it’s all over the place, as usual, from a solo jazz pianist to a one-hit wonder, from the Monkees to Lene Lovich, from the sublime Laura Marling to the recently departed, sadly neglected Fats Domino (a weirdly effective segue, I might add). But it’s not all over the place, not really, because the music absorbs it, the music supports it, and the idea that your ears are too tender to find coherence in a playlist that doesn’t stick to one genre or one era, well, that’s a stupid idea fostered by misguided entrepreneurs and the venture capitalists who feed them, and reinforced by cultural forces that even at this late date resist the manifest truth that diversity is our natural state. Enjoy the adventure, and see you for maybe a bit of a holiday thing in a few weeks.

Full playlist below the widget.

“Lullaby of the Leaves” – Art Tatum (Solos, 1940)
“The Mermaid” – Kate Rusby (Life in a Paper Boat, 2016)
“Ride Captain Ride” – Blues Image (Open, 1970)
“There Goes The Fear” – Doves (The Last Broadcast, 2002)
“Northern Lights” – Renaissance (A Song For All Seasons, 1978)
“Grace” – Jeff Buckley (Grace, 1994)
“I Want Something to Remember You By” – Marvin Smith (single, 1967)
“So Here We Are” – Gordi (Clever Disguise EP, 2016)
“Swamp Thing” – Chameleons UK (Strange Times, 1986)
“Stillsane” – Carolyne Mas (Carolyne Mas, 1979)
“The Girl I Knew Somewhere” – The Monkees (b-side, 1967)
“What Can I Say” – Brandi Carlile (Brandi Carlile, 2005)
“New Toy” – Lene Lovich (New Toy EP, 1981)
“Vapour Trail” – Ride (Nowhere, 1990)
“No Sugar Tonight” – The Shirelles (Happy and In Love, 1971)
“Ta Douleur” – Camille (Le Fil, 2005)
“I Believe” – Tim Booth & Angelo Badalamenti (Booth and the Bad Angel, 1996)
“Someone Up There” – Joe Jackson Band (Beat Crazy, 1980)
“Soothing” – Laura Marling (Semper Femina, 2017)
“Let The Four Winds Blow” – Fats Domino (Let The Four Winds Blow, 1961)

For a musician who sold so many records and who meant so much to so many people, Tom Petty still in the end managed to be somehow underappreciated. Maybe it was just his being that half-generation removed from the Mt. Rushmorean figures in rock history (Beatles, Dylan, Stones, etc.) that kept him flying somewhat below the radar when talking about rock’s monumental representatives. Or maybe it was the fact that his music, while cumulatively his own, wasn’t really pioneering, it was just incredibly effective. Anyway, Petty now sets a new if unfortunate template: for the musician who has to leave this world for us to take full note of his beloved place in it. I mean, it’s always something like that, but in this case I felt it keenly. Tom Petty was always just out there somewhere, being Tom Petty. And now he’s not. The time of course will come for all of us. Let’s do our best in the meantime to listen: to our own hearts, and to each other’s, and to the knocking of the door, and the growing of the grass. No more time for bullshit. The nightmare will end, the emperor will stand naked, and we won’t be lost if we stand by each other.

Full playlist below the widget.

“When the Time Comes” – Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers (You’re Gonna Get It!, 1978)
“12 Bellevue” – Kathleen Edwards (Failer, 2003)
“Theme From ‘Danger Man’” – The Red Price Combo (single, 1961)
“Tips For Teens” – Sparks (Whomp That Sucker, 1981)
“When I Was Your Girl” – Alison Moyet (The Minutes, 2013)
“Wanted” – The Cranberries (Everybody Else Is Doing It, So Why Can’t We?, 1993)
“What Good Am I Without You” – Darrow Fletcher (single, 1967)
“No More” – Julie Doiron (Woke Myself Up, 2006)
“Now That You’ve Gone” – Chicago (Chicago V, 1972)
“Tear The Whole Thing Down” – The Higsons (single, 1982)
“Hear You” – Waxahatchee (Out In The Storm, 2017)
“I Hear You Knockin’” – Smiley Lewis (single, 1955)
“This Heart” – Nanci Griffith (Flyer, 1994)
“Lost” – Frank Ocean (Channel Orange, 2012)
“Nightmare” – Artie Shaw (single, 1938)
“Life In Dark Water” – Al Stewart (Time Passages, 1978)
“Somewhere Sometime” – Roseanne Cash (King’s Record Shop, 1987)
“I Can Hear the Grass Grow” – the Move (single, 1967)
“Villain” – CocoRosie (Tales of a GrassWidow, 2013)
“The Emperor’s New Clothes” – Sinéad O’Connor (I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got, 1990)

Rules are not necessarily “meant to be broken,” as the odd saying goes; but, sometimes, a rule might be meaningfully circumvented. And so this month, I give you two songs from one artist as we open and close with Steely Dan, in honor of the recently departed Walter Becker. A hat tip along the way to obscure soul songs resuscitated by the internet, to the unhinged and brilliant “Twin Peaks” revival, and to a handful of well-known artists who wandered into the list this month with some lesser-known material. I should note that the Skip Drake song is as of yet unplaceable chronologically–it surely sounds like the ’60s but nowhere can I find confirmation. What year is this, indeed?

Full playlist below the widget.

“Kid Charlemagne” – Steely Dan (The Royal Scam, 1976)
“Nvr Surrender” – Rumble (Rumble ep.1, 2015)
“Wrapped Around Your Finger” – Skip Drake (Eccentric Soul: The Cash Label, 2014; originally 196_?)
“Laura” – Billy Joel (The Nylon Curtain, 1982)
“Hot Blood” – Lucinda Williams (Sweet Old World, 1992)
“Maybe After He’s Gone” – The Zombies (Odessey and Oracle, 1968)
“Blood and Chalk” – EMA (Exile in the Outer Ring, 2017)
“Slow Motion” – Blondie (Eat to the Beat, 1979)
“Felicidade” – Astrud Gilberto (Look to the Rainbow, 1966)
“Understanding Jane” – The Icicle Works (If You Want to Defeat Your Enemy, Sing His Song, 1986)
“I Have Laid in the Darkness of Doubt” – Mazes (Mazes, 2009)
“Water Song” – Hot Tuna (Burgers, 1972)
“Shiny” – The Decemberists (Five Songs EP, 2003)
“Falling” – Julee Cruise (Floating Into The Night, 1990)
“Can’t Live Without Your Love” – Janelle Monáe (The Electric Lady, 2013)
“L’Accord Parfait” – Autour de Lucie (L’Échappée belle, 1994)
“Southern Girls” – Cheap Trick (In Color, 1977)
“You Got Me” – The Roots (Things Fall Apart, 2004)
“The Hymn of Acxiom” – Vienna Teng (Aims, 2013)
“Third World Man” – Steely Dan (Gaucho, 1980)

Veal was a Canadian band that hung around off and on for nearly 10 years as the ’90s bled into the 21st century. “Judy Garland” comes from their third and final album, and is as accidentally great a song as I can think of, dropped in the middle of an obscure album by a forgotten band. Front man Luke Doucet remains active in Canada as a solo musician. “Judy Garland” was an early Fingertips find and all these years later I love this song to pieces.

“Kellyanne” is sadly self-explanatory. Juliana Hatfield sounds like an old friend calling out of the blue.

What a beautiful and unexpected little song is “I Fall Down,” still.

“Shilo” is way better than a song about an imaginary friend should be as well as better than I tend to think a Neil Diamond song is going to be (but I’m often wrong about that; he had some serious chops back in the day).

I could feature the Kinks every month and not run out of amazing songs; it’s only my self-imposed “no artist more than once a year” rule that keeps them away. We’ll get back to them in 2018, provided we’re all still around.

And Kirsty MacColl. Sigh.

A couple of outside credits this month. “Girls Girls Girls” came to my attention via the amazing Emma on the ever-engaging Said the Gramophone blog. It comes from a 2008 compilation of recordings put together around 1967 in East St. Louis by the veteran musician and producer Allen Merry, who at that point was working with young men at a community center, aiming to keep them off the streets and out of gangs. You can read more about the project, and listen to the whole album, here.

Secondly, the wonderful Mexican singer/songwriter Carla Morrison floated into my inbox via “Off Your Radar,” a newsletter featuring one weekly album recommendation, accompanied by a dozen or so reviews of that one album from their stable of music writers. OYR had recently recommended Morrison’s 2012 album Déjenme Llorar, which led me to dive into her catalog. She’s a terrific singer and an engaging personality; I’m happy to know of her work and will continue to familiarize myself with her catalog in the coming weeks.

And yes Kate Bush’s cover of “Sexual Healing” is odd in a number of ways but something about it charms me and moves me as it develops. Maybe when all is said and done it’s nothing more or less than the ineffable profundity of her singing voice. Her version of Marvin Gaye’s final classic was originally recorded in 1994 and intended for an album by the Irish musician Davey Spillane (whose uillean pipes are featured throughout), but it ultimately was left off. Bush finally released it as a b-side to “King of the Mountain,” the first and only single from her 2005 double-album Aerial.

Full playlist below the widget.

“Judy Garland” – Veal (The Embattled Hearts, 2003)
“Kellyanne” – Juliana Hatfield (Pussycat, 2017)
“Tainted Love” – Gloria Jones (single, 1964)
“Novocaine for the Soul” – Eels (Beautiful Freak, 1996)
“Wives and Lovers” – Cécile McLorin Salvant (For One to Love, 2015)
“I Fall Down” – U2 (October, 1981)
“Back to Black” – Amy Winehouse (Back to Black, 2007)
“Second Hand Store” – Joe Walsh (But Seriously, Folks…, 1978)
“Girls Girls Girls” – The Young Disciples Co. (single, 1967?)
“You Don’t Know What You’ve Got” – Joan Jett & The Blackhearts (Bad Reputation, 1981)
“H>A>K” – Jane Weaver (Modern Kosmology, 2017)
“Another Girl, Another Planet” – The Only Ones (The Only Ones, 1978)
“Shilo” – Neil Diamond (Just For You, 1967)
“All I Ever Wanted” – Kirsty MacColl (Electric Landlady, 1991)
“Nutty” – Thelonious Monk Quartet (Misterioso, 1958)
“Un Beso” – Carla Morrison (Amor Supremo, 2015)
“Strangers” – The Kinks (Lola Vs. Powerman and the Moneygoround, 1970)
“Beating of Hearts” – XTC (Mummer, 1983)
“Hello” – Poe (Hello, 1995)
“Sexual Healing” – Kate Bush (b-side, 2005)

A lot of big names slipped into this month’s playlist. It’s a summertime thing. Speaking of which, I find “Girls In Their Summer Clothes” to be as majestic and beautiful a song as Bruce Springsteen has ever written, and in my mind the one absolute classic he’s recorded in the 30 some-odd years that have passed since Born in the USA made him a stadium star. (Note: while I appreciate it emotionally, I found The Rising kind of ponderous and self-derivative musically speaking.) It came out on the 2007’s generally underrated Magic album and is a must-have on any summer playlist; if you happen to have never heard it before, you’re welcome.

One you almost certainly have not heard before is the odd little Patti LaSalle nugget, “How Many Times,” which was made available this month on an intriguing compilation that just came out last week called Mid-Century Sounds: Deep Cuts From the Desert, via Fervor Records. Given that I am a sucker for anything that says either “mid-century” or “deep cuts,” I could not pass this one by. The overall quality is erratic but the story, which you can read about here, is interesting, and there are a few goodies buried in here for those willing to dig into the hot desert sand.

And talk about buried goodies, how awesome is “I Stand Accused (Of Loving You),” from the The Glories, a criminally overlooked trio fronted by Frances Yvonne (Frankie) Gearing? This was the only song of theirs to crack the Billboard charts (for a mere two weeks); their other seven singles disappeared without a trace, at least until Goldenlane Records put them all out on a CD called The Glories: Soul Legend, in 2011. Many of them, now, sound good enough to have been hits, and have been embraced by Northern Soul fans, this one perhaps most fondly of all. But, sheesh, The Glories have slipped through the internet’s cracks for sure—they don’t even have a Wikipedia page, probably because there’s no reliable source material otherwise online.

Meanwhile, I finally found a place for Todd Rundgren on one of these playlists, and “Long Flowing Robe” is a terrific example of a lead track that was not a single, the kind of thing FM radio loved to play back in the day (there were no notable hit singles from Runt: The Ballad of Todd Rundgren; maybe because they never released this one?). And let’s not overlook the glory that is Dean Friedman’s “Ariel,” which was in fact something of a hit in 1977, coming in at number 87 for the year on the American Top 40 year-end chart. Although long since faded from the mainstream scene in the U.S., Friedman has all these years been recording and touring, and released the album 12 Songs just last month, as luck would have it. Take that as a reminder that luck does, sometimes, against the odds, have it.

Full playlist below the widget.

“Long Flowing Robe” – Todd Rundgren (Runt: The Ballad of Todd Rundgren, 1971)
“Almost” – Sarah Harmer (All Of Our Names, 2004)
“Strange Relationship” – Prince (Sign O’ the Times, 1988)
“Contessa” – Mice Parade (Candela, 2012)
“Tell Me When the Whistle Blows” – Elton John (Captain Fantastic and the Brown Dirt Cowboy, 1975)
“Maricela” – Los Lobos (Colossal Head, 1996)
“Thrasher” – Casey Dienel (Imitation of a Woman to Love, 2017)
“I Stand Accused (Of Loving You)” – The Glories (single, 1967)
“London Rain (Nothing Heals Me Like You Do)” – Heather Nova (Siren, 1998)
“Gates of Steel” – Devo (Freedom of Choice, 1980)
“Ariel” – Dean Friedman (Dean Friedman, 1977)
“Start a Little Late” – Annie Hayden (The Rub, 2001)
“Everything Now” – Arcade Fire (pre-release, Everything Now, 2017)
“How Many Times” – Patti LaSalle (single, 1960)
“Fast Buck Freddie” – Jefferson Starship (Red Octopus, 1975)
“Black Sails in the Sunset” – Elvis Costello (originally unreleased, 1980)
“Couldn’t Love You More” – Sade (Love Deluxe, 1992)
“Girls In Their Summer Clothes” – Bruce Springsteen (Magic, 2007)
“The Magic Touch” – Melba Moore (single, 1966)
“Over There” – The Connells (Boylan Heights, 1987)