Spearhead "Hole In The Bucket"

Here's another Weekend Post:

I know Michael Franti has had some commercial breakthrough success in the last few years.  If you're only familiar with the last 2 albums, it's totally worth your while to go back to his 90s output, both with the early Spearhead record, and his previous group Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy.


Hear the song on Youtube.

Weekend posts are a chance to revisit songs that have happy memories, not of anything in particular, other than just hearing the tunes.

Many of these songs were tracks that I played during my 90s stint as an Alternative/Modern Rock radio show.  They're tunes that I hardly hear these days, but are fun to revisit.

Click on the "Weekend Posts" label below, to see other posts like this.

Michael Franti "I'm Alive"

The new Michael Franti single and album were hotly anticipated items this Spring, for stations like MVY, and for listeners of those stations.

And it was no surprise that a) most of the radio stations that report to the same Billboard chart at MVY started playing the song immediately, and b) it rocketed up the charts.

In fact, this week, "I'm Alive" sits atop the "Triple A R&R/BDS Indicator Chart," a long way in front of the number two song "Stompa" by Serena Ryder.

A song gets to Number One on this chart, based on airplay spins.  Meaning, they count every spin that every song got that week, from all the radio stations that report to that chart, and rank them by total spins.

This week "I'm Alive" was played more than any other song. Franti wins.

Which is why we're going to stop playing it.

I am a longtime fan and supporter of Michael Franti.  I love what he stands for, I love his positivity, I love his passion.

One of the nicest gifts I ever got from an artist/label, hangs in my office.  It's a signed Franti poster, with the words written in Sharpie, "PJ, Maximum Respect," and his signature below.

But truthfully, "I'm Alive" isn't a very good fit for MVY.

Franti's music has always been on the fringe of our sound.  It's more programmed-beat-driven, more hip-hop leaning lyric and delivery, and generally more poppy than anything we play.

At times, his songs have been close enough to exist on the outskirts of what we do.  But some of the singles he's put out have pushed the envelope a little to far, and we've not added the song at all.

"I'm Alive" was so hotly anticipated, that we added it right away.

But in the following days and weeks, I'd hear the song on MVY and often cringe, as it felt so stylistically out of place.

So now it's hit Number One, and I can feel good about dropping it.

Previously, the number of times MVY played the song per week, was added to every time our contemporaries played it on their stations.  For us to pull our support would have meant a (small) loss in momentum for a guy I am sincerely pulling for.  And it could even have effected his ranking on the charts.  This week only 1 spin separates the Number 4 song (Vampire Weekend) from the Number 3 song (JJ Grey).

Franti's at Number One, and with nowhere else to go but back down, so having MVY stop supporting the song makes no difference.

Franti's "Alive."  He reached the top.  And now it's time to let it drop.


Hear the song on Youtube.

Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy "Television Drug Of The Nation"

Here's another Weekend Post:

Looking at the Life Is Good line-up, I realized that a number of the artists on the bill are folks I've been following for a long, long time.

My first awareness of Michael Franti came through this tune, with his early 90s, pre-Spearhead group, Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy.

Michael Franti plays the main stage tonight at Life Is Good this weekend.  Follow our coverage on the mvyradio Facebook page.


Hear the song on Youtube.

Weekend posts are a chance to revisit songs that have happy memories, not of anything in particular, other than just hearing the tunes.

Many of these songs were tracks that I played during my 90s stint as an Alternative/Modern Rock radio show.  They're tunes that I hardly hear these days, but are wonderful to revisit.

Click on the "Weekend Posts" label below, to see other posts like this.

Michael Franti "Hey Hey Hey"

I had a quick conversation with Barbara on Tuesday, where we listened to the latest Michael Franti. She likes it, and I like it too---but as usual, I asked, "Is it right for mvy?"

I watched the videos below, remembered I'd had this conversation with myself before and let my hesitation drop.

Any ship that Michael Franti is sailing, I want to be a passenger on.

Michael Franti “Sound Of Sunshine”

What is Michael Franti doing, do you think?

We all have our opinion of who an artist is, and what they should sound like. And when an artist decides to defy that definition, we have to ask (often with some annoyance), What are they doing?

It’s harder for artists than you think. For every U2 fan open to a band that tries to forward their sound every couple of records, there’s a Bruce Springsteen fan who asks with each new Boss release, “When is he going to make another album that sounds like ‘Born To Run’?” Elvis Costello can dabble in country and classical and opera, without too much fan repercussion. But Eric Clapton better not even think about it.

So, being aware that my questioning is typical fan prejudice, What do you think Michael Franti is doing?

Franti’s earliest material, with the outfit Disposable Heroes Of Hiphoprisy, was decidedly, overtly political. You don’t cover "California Uber Alles" without a revolutionary ax to grind. “Television, Drug Of The Nation” was one of the most scathing songs of its era.

In the late 90s/early 2000s, Franti downplayed the anger, but still focused on social political causes, tackling HIV, poverty and the racial divide, with thoughtfulness.

So there was evolution, but it still a surprise to hear last year’s “Say Hey,” which, on the surface, seemed like nothing but a party song, a crossover hit, a stab at commercialism.

Franti has followed it up with this year’s “Sound Of Sunshine.” And the cynic in me wondered if he’d abandoned his principles, if he’d given up on creating social change through the power of music.

But I started thinking about this documentary he made a few years ago, called “I Know I’m Not Alone.”

In it, he traveled to the Middle East to talk to Muslims and Jews about their views of each other, and of peace.

Noting that there was a language divide between the cultures and communities he was talking to, he dug around, looking for a single word, most of the folks he’d cross paths with, would recognize, that had a positive meaning. He wrote this one word song, “Habibe” (it roughly means “sweetheart”) and performed it, inspiring the Jews and the Muslims and the Christians and the white people and the black people and the old and the young and the angry and the resigned to sing along wherever he went.

And so I go back to “Sound Of Sunshine,” and the idealist in me wonders---did he have a change, not of heart but of focus, on his politics? Has he given himself, fully, over to the notion that maybe he can create the social change he dreams of, not by castigating, but by uniting?

Does talking about love, does producing a song so joyous that people can’t resist coming together . . . does that make more of a real world difference that 100 songs about California Governors?

Let the cynic in you consider Bob Marley, who is perhaps most successfully, of any artist in our lifetime, motivated people to address their political concerns though his music. Let the cynic ask the next person you see, “Quick. Name a Bob Marley song.”

Did they say “Them Belly Full”? “Get Up Stand Up”?

Or did they say “One Love”? “Three Little Birds”? Or “Positive Vibration”?

All are great songs, but which had a farther cultural reach?

So maybe you can write off “Sound Of Sunshine” for its shiny, happy surface.

But maybe Michael Franti just unwittingly engaged you in some deep political discourse.



The “I Know I’m Not Alone” Trailer


The Habibe scene