Playlist for
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
November 21, 2008

Hosted by Greg Lyon on FRIDAYS at 2-4 pm
on WPVM Asheville (103.5 FM and www.wpvm.org)

Notes:

– Much new music today, much of it also quite good–especially USA Is a Monster, who played here in Asheville the same night that Deerhunter was playing down the street at the Orange Peel. I can tell you that I was ecstatic that I chose USA Is a Monster. I never knew that they would remind me so much of the French band Magma, and that’s a good thing.

Playlist for
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
November 14, 2008

Hosted by Greg Lyon on FRIDAYS at 2-4 pm
on WPVM Asheville (103.5 FM and www.wpvm.org)

Notes:

– This week’s musical highlight was the show by Paul Metzger and Tim Kaiser at Harvest Records. These guys are from Minnesota and each played solo sets that expanded my brain more than 99% of my usual musical consumption. Tim Kaiser plays instruments that he has invented, mostly analog electro-acoustic in some form or another, and it was SO refreshing to see someone play "electronic" music wihout a damned laptop and with a true sense of space. ATTENTION laptop people: STOP IT! PLEASE!!!! Rant over, and now back to Tim Kaiser… His instruments are flat out c-o-o-l; you can see and hear them for yourself by going to the website for Atomic Sonic, his instrument-building business. My favorite was the OptoVox2 (seen above), which is a kind of theremin played with a light pen, as the sound is activated by light sensors in the holes. One of the characteristics of Tim’s instruments and playing that I found refreshing is that they mostly lack sharp attacks, which allows for gradual transitions and an other-worldly mellowness that nonetheless refuses to fade into ambience. This is not background music, and it is definitely worth the pennies he asks for CDs (which themselves are works of art).

– Second came Paul Metzger, who plays banjo and guitar, only not the kind of banjo and acoustic guitar you would expect, as they’re modified with extra strings and weird percussive add-ons that allow him to make a ruckus and drone all at the same time. With so many Fahey wannabes out there, seeing Paul play restored my faith in the capacity of the acoustic guitar (and banjo, for that matter) to be a truly innovative medium. This is intense music–so intense in fact that one very drunken listener began to sway and chant like he was at a Pentecostal church service, freaked out, tried to stand up and fell into Paul’s rig before being helped outside, all while Paul kept on blowing our heads. Damned fine. Something weird and wonderful must be in the water in Minnesota. I left inspired.

– The Shadow Ring ask us: "Did Vikings, I am asking you, did Vikings have lifesavers?"

Playlist for
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
November 7, 2008

Hosted by Greg Lyon on FRIDAYS at 2-4 pm
on WPVM Asheville (103.5 FM and www.wpvm.org)

Notes:

– This was one happy and rockin’ fund drive show, thanks in great part to my magnificent, candescent co-host, Peter Poffenberger of the Ooze Out! radio program on WPVM (Tuesday nights, 10-midnight or later). We brought in "happy" music, and because the phones rang, we were also happy. This show was probably my best fund drive show, and that’s saying something because last week’s Halloween show with Dr. Filth was also pretty frakkin’ great. Thanks to all who gave to WPVM during the show–and any other time, for that matter!

Playlist for
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
October 31, 2008

Hosted by Greg Lyon on FRIDAYS at 2-4 pm
on WPVM Asheville (103.5 FM and www.wpvm.org)

This show is available for listening as an archive for one week after its airing at WPVM’s Archive Page (click on the STREAM button for this show–under the letter ‘G’)

Notes:

– Halloween AND the Fall 2008 WPVM Listener Fund Drive AND Dr. Filth of WPVM’s The Replacement Party all converged on The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly to create a rippin’, fiendish, ghoulish, creepy, sick, and totally fun radio show. Dr. Filth has a monstrously huge Halloween-themed record collection, and of course we barely touched the surface in two hours, but we definitely got in some treats.

– My favorite cut was Jimmy Cross’s "I Want My Baby Back," a classic Teenage Death Song which hit #95 on the Billboard charts in 1965. It describes a guy and his girlfriend coming home after a Beatles concert and having a head-on collision with "the leader of the pack." I’ll give you the lyrics from there:

Well, when I come to I looked around,
and there was the leader,
and there was the pack,

And over there was myyy baby.

And over there was my baby.

And waaay over there was my baby!

At the end of the song, our protagonist wants his baby back so bad that he opens up her coffin, gets in, (we hear the coffin door slam shut), and sings the final chorus (muffled) from the grave ("I’ve got my baby back!"). Absolutely brilliant. [The cover image is from a 1978 reissue, but Dr. Filth of course had the original 7" on Tollie Records.]

– The Best Innuendo Lyrics award goes to The Apollos’ "It’s a Monster" (from Pebbles Vol. 13): "All the other girls would like to have it too / It’s the biggest love in the world / And I give it just to you. / My love’s a monster / My love’s a monster." Later, just in case you didn’t get the joke the first time, the singer yells, "It’s a beast! And it keeps on growing!"

– I brought in Tony Snell’s bizzaro-folk ESP-Disk album, "Medieval and Latter Day Lays" from 1973, and played the creepy song "Brownie", narrated by a "lord of the manor" (in best Vincent Price style) who kills his servants with a shotgun and declares "There’s a brownie at the bottom of my bonfire!" again and again. So what the hell is this brownie he’s talking about???? It’s times like these where I break out my trusty Oxford English Dictionary and discover that a brownie is "A benevolent spirit or goblin, of shaggy appearance, supposed to haunt old houses, esp. farmhouses, in Scotland, and sometimes to perform useful household work while the family were asleep." The word is first documented in a text from 1513. But you, dear reader, knew exactly what that meant, right?

– THANK YOU to all the listeners who called and donated to the WPVM Fall 2008 Listener Fund Drive. If you haven’t donated yet, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE call up the station this week at 828-258-0085 and SUPPORT WPVM by DONATING! I’ll be sitting in with Dr. Filth for his show this week (The Replacement Party, Thursday 8-11pm) during the Fund Drive, convincing you all to support WPVM some more. And then I do The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly on the last day of the Fund Drive (we certainly hope), with the great Peter Poffenberger of the Ooze Out! radio program as my co-pilot. WPVM needs your support. We’re completely volunteer-run, and all the money goes towards the bills to keep WPVM on the air. We’re frugal, but we need your help. Join our community by becoming a contributor!

Playlist for
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly
October 24, 2008

Hosted by Greg Lyon on FRIDAYS at 2-4 pm
on WPVM Asheville (103.5 FM and www.wpvm.org)

This show is available for listening as an archive for one week after its airing at WPVM’s Archive Page (click on the STREAM button for this show–under the letter ‘G’)

Notes:

– Jonathan Meiburg of Shearwater was waiting for me at the station when I got there and stayed during the entire show. He brought his banjo and acoustic guitar, sang two songs, ate lunch, and chewed the fat with me on the air on topics ranging from Sarah Palin’s appearance on Saturday Night Live to some of the positive side-effects of the crappy economy (rosy glasses indeed). We also talked about music, including his take on Shearwater’s opening gigs for Coldplay, the lost world of the early recording era, what he listened to growing up (his parents were heavy on the Bread and Simon & Garfunkel records, and his Episcopal Church choir masters turned him on to Renaissance music), the revelation that he has never listened to a single Jeff or Tim Buckley record in its entirety (future interviewers take note), the lousy current state of the craft of music production and engineering (the disastrous overuse of compression), and the weirdness of the transition to digital downloads in the music industry (Shearwater’s new EP, The Snow Leopard, is digital-download-only), among other things.

– Jonathan also chose some records to spin, including the incredibly depressing Lou Reed track "The Kids" from the 1973 album Berlin, for which producer Bob Ezrin reportedly recorded his own kids crying after he falsely told them that their mother had died. Considering they’re probably about my age, I wonder if those kids ever beat the crap out of their father for doing that to them; I can only imagine the psychic scarring that is so clearly evident in their wailing. Jonathan also brought in one of those Secret Museum of Mankind CDs compiling old field recordings from around the globe, and we played a choral piece from Polynesia with some hair-raising quarter-tone note bends.

– I want to thank Jonthan for stopping by and hanging out–and especially for the beautiful two songs he sang and played for us. I also want to thank Robby Morris at Matador Records/Beggars Banquet for setting up this interview. [The photo above is taken from Matador's Shearwater website, who in turn credit it to Jalapeño's flickr.]

– Tune in next week for a special Halloween version of the The Good, the Bad, & the Ugly! It’s the first day of the WPVM Fall Fund Drive, and my special co-host will be none other than Dr. Filth, host of WPVM’s thoroughly ass-kickin’ The Replacement Party. He’s bringing scary music, so get ready to be so frightened and thrilled that you call up and GIVE GIVE GIVE to WPVM!

Background Music: Charles Mingues – The Great Concert of Charles Mingues – Prestige (1964)