( continues...) when WCBS-FM in NYC started with their Oldies format in the early 70s, so like a hip baby duck I imprinted on pre-British Invasion rock and roll, at least the ones that were really cool, but alas for every cool one there were ten boring ones, and it seems like the boring ones (unless they were "In the Still of the Nite" and a handful of others that seemed to be popular with the DJs despite their brilliance) got more air.

However? This song was not among the ones that I listened to in those faraway days, it took until I ran across the Rhino Records box sets for me to discover that there was more than I'd ever got to hear, or in fact much of anyone, since there were all sorts of regional hits that never broke nationally, or played in NY for that matter.

So... well, I don't know anything more about the Valentines than you can read in the wonderful liner notes in the box set, but I do know this: they must have been terrific in performance. The word that comes to mind to describe this song is muscular -- don't be put off by the falsettos. I'm also seriously in love with the horn player who blats away like a house on fire.

(Note that #12 also fits #13 nicely, as well as a good break for #6.)

13. A song that does not feature a guitar or a piano as the main instrument

"Doctor Who: Main Title" by the Ray Winstone Orchestra. You'd be surprised how many candidates I have that fit the bill here... and I'm not talking all the jazz recordings I have on hand, either. I had some really nice hurdy-gurdy music lined up, but a recent discussion in the Box Set led me to a website about the Doctor Who theme and the changes it had gone through over the years, which reminded me of my Brain in a Box set, and presto, changeo I was listening to this song, when it hit me that it would be timely and fun for this mix.

14. A song by a band that you could have, but didn't, write about for Lost in The Grooves.

"Miniskirt" by Combustible Edison and Esquivel!. You know, once I started thinking about it, and all the really cool bands had been taken, I found myself debating between the Headstones and the Edisons, but then I decided that at least the Headstones have Canadian Gold Records, whereas the Edisons pretty much labored in unrightful obscurity. It wasn't until I'd listened to a whole lot more lounge music that I realized that they improved upon the original, as though they'd refined the vein of pure cool.

15. An upbeat song about a sad thing.

"Pink Victim" by Combustible Edison. Exquisite little gem about not being able to overcome your own faults here -- a life of sad desperation, you might say, all to a sophisticated beat you can dance to. It's like dysfunctional champagne!

16. Midnight driving in the rain music.

"Canceling Stamps At The University Of Ghana Post Office" by Postal Works - Univ. of Ghana Post Office. At midnight, I don't need any more hypnotic noise than the sound of the wipers, I'm already halfway to sleep. But I don't want some guy screaming in my ear about how much he's getting laid or not, I don't want despair or dysfunction or pretty much anything to do with D's. Hence, I turn to this ethnomusicology-collected cut, which is exactly what the title suggests it is, recorded live while people worked away very cheerily. This will get me sitting up straighter in my driver's seat, tapping my hands on the wheel and feeling very much more awake and alive, thank you.

17. More cowbell: A song containing that essential instrument

"Tainted Love/Where Did Our Love Go" by Soft Cell. I confess to having to go to the internet list of what songs contain cowbell, since I can barely hear it on most records. I was surprised by a) how many songs have it and b) how many of point (a) that I have access to that I actually like. Maybe cowbell is really that essence rare, or something.

As for why I chose this one... well, it's been a favorite ever since I was on a dance floor in 1983 when I heard it for the first time. Yeah, I danced my way through it, (continued...)

( continues...) enchanted, not knowing where it was goign when it segued into the reprise of the Supremes song. It was one of the best musical surprises of my life, I think in retrospect, which has rarely been topped.

(Note that it would amply fill the requirements for #27 as well.)

18. A song that reminds you of your first love

"Astro Boy: Main Theme" credited to "Orchestra". I flailed a little for this one, meaning to get a Monkees or Iggy cut, since I wanted to Go Cute, but due to technical difficulties (like not having them at home, just on my Work Computer) I needed something else, and when I looked up #13, there it was just a few cuts below, and I remembered how much my childish heart twingled for Astro Boy and Space Ghost and Kimba the White Lion. Falling in love all over again with anime seems like a natural progression for me, really.

19. A song that references some kind of technology

"Radio Rhythm" by Fletcher Henderson. I'd shoot myself if I couldn't find at least one out and out jazz cut to include here, so going with this 1931 song -- back when radio was still new, and imagining it coming out of somebody's parlor radio just as the Depression was really hitting it's stride -- oh yeah. This band was so tight you could bounce quarters off it... and that was back when quarters were worth something.

It also counts for a lot of other categories. For all I know, there might be cowbell in it too, as well as a kitchen sink.

20. A song with a chorus that compels you to sing along or that you cannot not dance to

"Saved" by LaVern Baker. In another decade, Baker would have been lionessed like Ethel Merman or Billie Holiday, but she had the bad luck of coming along after the era of big shouters had passed. She made some glorious and fun music, and I ran across this cut fairly recently, and had the audio equivalent of my ears streaming back in the breeze. "I used to lie/And cheat/And step on people's feet...." -- salvation has never sounded more fun, you know? I sometimes really do get up and dance around to this -- love the bass drum beating away in the background. 21. A song that starts with a bassline

"Twine Time" by Alvin Cash and the Crawlers. Oh, so many to pick from here, but I ended up with a cut that is basically all bass with intermittent bursts of shouting and drumming and horns -- horns like the tromp of doom, and a rinky-tink organ going all-out spooky. And did I mention the falsetto screams? There's something so hypnotically primitive about this, like you boiled down the essence of rhythm and blues, and bottled it up to apply as you need. Take two before you go to bed.

22. A song that relates to science

"Lovin' Machine" by Wynonie Harris. Long before Alan Parsons thought up the first note of "I, Robot", long before Thomas Dolby was even conceived, Wynonie Harris was taking technology where it had never gone before, and would still probably be illegal in many states, in fact. Plus, this song was recorded in 1951, well before the formal definition of "rock and roll" was established....

23. A song you sing (or would sing) to your pet and/or child

"Ragtime Cowboy Joe" by Alvin and the Chipmunks. Don't ask me how we ended up with this and #21 as they both have leads named Alvin, which strikes me as weird indeed. But I loved this song as a kid, and now that I'm this old, I still love in all its considerable weirdness, and repeat phrases from it to myself on occasion, like "Reach for the sky, you sidewinder!" Plus, those Grammies that Ross Bagdasarian got for engineering these songs weren't for nothing. (I didn't know that he did all the Chipmunk voices until I was reading up in preparation for this -- I thought it was three random singers, speeded up, of course.)

24. A song that haunts you

"Goodnight Moon" by Shivaree. My friend Lynnmonster had an awesomely good Halloween mix last fall, and from it I got this exquisite song, which sounds all soft and nonthreatening until you really listen to the lyrics. Best listened (continued...)

( continues...) to when you're all alone in the house and it's late at night and you hear something creaking. Sort of the opposite of a comfort song.

(Lynn also came up with #9, BTW. She is teh awesome.)

25. A song that you would sing to yourself if you were ever in a dire situation and needed it to keep going

Well... quite a few of them, actually -- see #23, #4, #6, #9, et and cetera. Had to cut a corner somewhere to keep this under 80 minutes!

26. A song by a band with an awful name

"Mannequins" by the Hugh Dillon Redemption Choir. Yeah, I really do adore Dillon a whole lot, his writing, singing, acting, he really is that good. And I think the Headstones is a great band name, actually. But the HDRC... not so much a good band name, even if it's a damn good outfit. Dillon has some name recognition in Canada, so it's not entirely awful, and his struggles with substance abuse are also quite well known... and this new band marks the era of the best recovery he's had yet, the one that looks like it may well take.

As for the song, it's a terrificly fierce apocalyptic vision that puts me in mind of 28 Days Later.

27. A song that even when you know it's time to LEAVE the BAR someone can put on the jukebox to make you stay

"Le Freak" by The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain. If I was leaving with a group and this started to play, I would not only try to talk my friends into sitting down and listening, I might forcibly nail them into their chairs and gag them, so fierce would be my desire to make them listen all the way through. I love so many things about this -- not only the instruments (all ukuleles, which one of the members calls 'bonsai guitars') but the cool and ironic performance of the singer, who manages to put quotes around every line, and the infective enthusiasm of the players. There's also the lovely accent.

Another quote from another performance by this band: "All you need is four strings and the truth." Amen.

I'm in the middle of making my third or fourth attempt to upload a You Send It zip file so that it would be easier to get it all in one big lump. ::Le Sigh::

YSI takes forever to upload. I'm looking forward to downloading your mix, though.

And it crapped out on me again -- before finally working!

[link]

This includes a .txt file of the liner notes.

Please enjoy!

ELO, whom I hated with the force of a thousand burning nuns

I just wanted to see that again.

Theo, your mix looks awesome!

I hope it stands up to closer scrutiny!

I've added so very many songs in the past couple weeks that I'm actually way behind on listening to and appreciating. Some are immediate standouts, like the Calliopa song, and the chain gang one, "Your Adorable Beast", "Short Skirt, Long Jacket," "Hello Hello," "Sunkeneyed Girl", "Rockin' in Rhythm," "Jesus Help Me to Stand" -- which doesn't include songs I've actually heard before this and like quite a lot already, and then all the songs that I haven't even heard yet, plus the songs that don't appeal so much on the first listen as much as they grow on you sneakily over time.

Just in case anyone passing through here doesn't have access to Buffistarawk2, the current YSI link is:

[link]

"Doctor Who: Main Title" by the Ray Winstone Orchestra.

Ray Winstone, the Will Scarlet, dial a bad guy of British cinema, Ray Winstone?

Or another Ray Winstone?

I'm not sure -- that is how the file is listed, and I'd never heard of the guy before yesterday. It could be that someone hacked the CDDB? I'll have to haul out the actual Box set and see what it says.