Garland Jeffreys "Any Rain"

Have you ever had this experience at one of those buffet restaurants?

You start filling your plate with things that really look good.  And when you get back to your table, you realize that your meal consists of a slice of prime rib, lasagna, a crab leg and some Brunswick stew?

You were just thinking about what looked good.  You weren't thinking about balance.

That happens from time to time, while programming the station.

I think most people who don't do this job just assume . . . you pick the best couple of song each week and that becomes your playlist.

But if you do that, without consideration of the bigger picture, you can end up with an unbalanced and awkward plate.

Coming out of the summer rush into some clearer-headed fall consideration, I felt that the station's list of new songs had started leaning toward the modern/alternative a little too heavily.

The playlist is full of Avett Brothers and Vampire Weekend and Neko Case and Elvis Costello & The Roots.

But the MVY tradition is rooted in singers and songwriters.  And I realized that the plate was really lacking in artists the huat more closely to the folk roots that are the baseline of MVY.

And that's when, as a programmer, you worry less about the best song, and more about the right song.

It was great to see Garland Jeffreys new record come in, because I knew it was the first step in speaking to the missing part of the current playlist.


Hear the song on Youtube.

Rocket From The Crypt "He's A Chef"

If you asked me, say, 3 years ago, if I was gonna go see the Yo Gabba Gabba set at Life Is Good, I'm sure I would have responded, "Hell No."

We're pretty selective about what we let our kids (5 and 3 years old) watch.  Partly because we try to be thoughtful, attentive parents.  Partly out of necessity.

The necessity part, is that in our efforts of control our spending, we decided a long time ago to ditch all but the most basic cable.  So my wife had to forgo new episodes of "Project Runway."  I have to get my dose of "The Daily Show" from the web.

And the only real option for the kids, is whatever PBS Kids is offering.

While we treat Barney and Caillou like the pariahs they should be considered . . . pretty much everything else on PBS Kids is gold.  Curious George, Sesame Street, Dinosaur Train?  All very cute and educational.  Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood?  Totally worthy of bearing Fred Rodger's name.  Peep And The Big Wide World?  Quack may just be the funniest character on television.  And Word Girl?  It totally brings back some of the wacked 70s sensibility that I remember and love so well, while being generally hilarious.

And its a good thing I can find something enjoyable in these shows, because we try to limit the screen time in the house, which means that the kid's screen time, is MY screen time.  At least until they are in bed for the night.

We can't shield the kids from a non-PBS world, so they do watch Nickelodeon and Disney, etc, when we're at the grandparents.  But the good educational shows on those channels pale in comparison.  And the bad ones are horrible.

I can't even look at those creepy faces of The Doodlebops or The Wiggles, or some of the other garish, loud and annoying shows.

So when the kids brought home a DVD from the library of "Yo Gabba Gabba" I made some kind of disgusted frowny face, but figured they'd watch it once and then I'd return it quietly in the dead of night, never to be mentioned again.

But I watched a little bit of it.

That first time through was not unlike that first time you take a little too much cough medicine.  When it ended you weren't quite sure what just happened and had to check that the floor was no longer undulating.

Repeated viewing became more pleasurable, filled with plenty of laughable "What the hell?" moments of non-sequitoriums.

And then come the guest stars.

Biz Markie, Devo, Weezer, The Roots, The Flaming Lips, The Aquabats (one of the band members is the show's co-creator), Jack Black and The Shins, just to name a few.

I think the tipping point for me was when I realized, "Holy Shit, Rocket From The Crypt has actually reformed, and I learned it via DJ Lance."

If Yo Gabba Gabba has become the refuge for 90s punk rock, then I guess I can warm up to the fact that it's weird, loud and non-educational.

So yes, on Sunday, I was singing, "My name is PJ, P-p-p-p-p-J.  And I like to dance!"


Hear "He's A Chef" on Youtube.


Hear "I Like To Dance" on Youtube.

LL Cool J “Mama Said Knock You Out”

While writing about the Bob Dylan cover version of this song, I was reminded of an LL Cool J version---not the original.

Sure, I liked the original. It had the right mix of LL punch and swagger.

But the version that really stands out to me as a seminal musical moment, is from an MTV Unplugged episode.

Rap music is so much a part of the culture now, it’s hard to imagine a time when it didn’t have wide main stream acceptance, or even the acceptance as a legitimate musical form from the musical establishment. But yeah, even in the late 80s/early 90s Rap was having to defend its credibility.

Among the not-entirely-baseless claims was that Rap was a studio confection, that could not be reproduced in a live setting.

At the time, if you saw a Rap act in concert, you probably saw the MC onstage, maybe a DJ in the background, and the music was provided by a backing track. Flat and flaccid.

MTV was having a pretty successful run with its Unplugged format, and while there was no one Rap performer who could carry a full episode, they at least insured a curiosity factor, filling an episode with a couple songs each by De La Soul, A Tribe Called Quest, MC Lyte and LL Cool J, backed by a live instrument House Band.

The thing about concerts on TV is that they can only do so much to transcend the medium. With rare exception, the power of being in the room with a live act, is completely squeezed out when wrung through a TV’s tiny speakers and screen.

With rare exception.

I don’t know that the YouTube clip is going to do it justice either, but I remember watching on my TV as LL took the stage on this episode (which had the unfortunate title “Yo! Unplugged Rap”). The camera shows enough of the audience to really get the sense that the power of his performance was winning the crowd over, second by second, until the song’s frenzied conclusion, in the same manner it was winning me over at home.

It was an impressive performance, and I think it went a long way to legitimize the form for non-believers, as well as pave the way for the acceptance of live instrumentation in Rap, from bands like The Roots and The Beastie Boys, among others.