HARMONY IN MY HEAD

BROADCAST #30
AIR DATE: 07-25-06

Alright Fanatics, this is what we heard tonight. I tried to make this one interesting and all over the place. We were listening to Steve Jones today here at the office as we usually do and he played Vanilla Ice. This kind of ruins my attempt to be the only person playing Vanilla Ice on the station in a 24 hour period. Jonesy went for a conceptual set and the track he used was part of that. I went for one a bit more obscure. If you have noticed, I am throwing more jazz back into our set. As I remember, the Be Bop stuff goes down well with you Fanatics and why not? Coltrane, Shepp, Ornette and others are what this show is all about. I hope you enjoyed tonight’s show and I’ll be back with you live now and then starting in September. This being my last live show before we go into the pre-taped shows, I wanted to remind you that we have some really great programming coming up. Next week, we will play our Miles Davis show. I think you’re going to like this one. Great shows to follow. Stay Fanatic! --Henry
For you Europeans, Australians and New Zealand Fanatics, there is a re-broadcast time of Friday mornings, 0200 – 0400 hrs. West coast time so you all can check out the show and not have to set your alarms to too rude an hour. If you want to download this show, http://www.rollins-archive.com/ is the place to go for that.

Slayer – Death’s Head: From the Diabolus In Musica album. I play this one a lot. Since I saw them play last week and didn’t play them on the show, I figured I had better pay tribute to the band that never relents.

Richard Berry – You Look So Good: This is from the Have Louie Will Travel album. The title’s reference to Louie is of course from Berry’s big hit Louie, Louie, which probably took the guy pretty far but not far enough for my liking as I think he was one of the supreme rocker balladeers of the last century. There’s a quality to his voice that is so raw yet so refined at the same time. Dynamically, it reminds me of Little Richard when he did all those amazing sides for Specialty.

Bootsy – Rubber Duckie: From Bootsy’s Ah…The Name’s Bootsy, Baby album. One of best and effortlessly performed shows I have ever seen in my life. Bootsy and band KILLED it that night and no one in the band was even sweating two hours in. They were so relaxed while they pulverized us. As you know, Bootsy is one of bass monsters of the world. A bass god. A bass master. Playing with James Brown at 16 and from there into some band called Parliament. I guess he’s pretty good and we’ll let him stay.

Vanilla Ice – Living: From the appropriately titled Hard To Swallow album. It was an early mid-life crisis album for Vanilla. He went all Nu Rock on us. And for a lot of Old Skool rappers (like myself) we’re waiting for him to come back to the street where he belongs so he can hip us to what’s happening out there in big bad world which we are too scared to go out in. Wait a minute, we go out in it every day. This is beginning to read like a Stallone script. Ok, we played this song tonight because every once in awhile you need to take a beating to stay tough. Consider this tough love.

CRASS – Sucks: From The Feeding Of The 5000 album. It’s good to throw some CRASS into the mix. I remember the CRASS records from way back when. A lot people had them but only the hardcore types played them over and over. Nothing they did was all that well recorded or produced by regular standards but I always thought what they were doing was really cool because it was truly the music-message thing with a Lightweights Beware sign on the font lawn. Anarcho Punk ya’ll!

The Fall – The Quartet Of Doc Shanley: The album this track was taken from, 1997 release, Levitate. One of The Fall’s more interesting records I think. I didn’t understand it at first but after a few listens I thought it was really great. There’s no Fall album I have all than much against though but that’s no surprise. Worth checking out, this one. There’s a 2CD version with b-sides and live tracks. If you want more information on this record and anything else on this band, there’s a website that I think I may have mentioned at some point but if I have somehow forgotten, here it is: http://www.visi.com/fall/.

J. Mascis & Friends – Take Me Home: Some of you Fanatics may remember that we played a track from the J. Mascis & Friends Sing And Chant For Amma album As you know, I am a Fanatic of all things Mascis. This album is not all that easy to find and not really talked about as far as I can tell. For more information on this record and Amma, check this site out: http://jmascis.com/content/view/19/2/

Negative Trend – Mercenaries / Meat House / Black And Red / How Ya Feelin’?: Our EP of the week is Negative Trend’s four song beast. I have played almost if not all of these songs on this show before. Tonight, we listen to all four so you can be destroyed by the sheer power and brilliance of the EP in its entirety. I have wondered what an album length release of songs this good would have done for the band. Here are my online notes about the EP, which I re-issued last year. A Negative Trend in Music: About 25 years ago, I found a single at Skip Groff’s Yesterday and Today record store that has remained one of my favorite 7” records of all time: The Negative Trend EP. I knew nothing about the band and probably bought it because it was only two dollars. The first time I played the four song EP, I was blown away by the heaviness of the band and the dark intensity of the singer. It occurred to me that these were not boys but angry men who played with malice. Many of us in the DC scene got the record and immediately became fans. Over the years I would see the Negative Trend record here and there, mostly bootlegged versions of the 7” and the occasional copy of the 12” re-release. At one point in the late 90’s, I asked the band’s drummer Steve DePace what was happening with the Negative Trend record and told him if I ever found out where the tapes were, I was going to put that record out so everyone could hear it. Early this year, I found them and we’re releasing the EP on CD. Steve from Subterranean Records mastered the record from the master mix tapes at Fantasy Studios in Berkeley CA and we worked off my single for the artwork. The tape held up over all these years and the mastering is fantastic. The Negative Trend EP never sounded better. I am so excited to be releasing this record on my label. The EP contains four songs: Mercenaries, Meat House, Black and Red, How Ya Feelin’. Four bludgeoning, savage, Stooges-like punches in the face that have not lost any power in over a quarter century. The Negative Trend EP and Black Flag’s Nervous Breakdown EP are in my opinion, the two most intense 7” EPs from the whole American Punk Rock-Hardcore shootin’ match. We are offering the Negative Trend EP on CD for five dollars. If you are a fan of pop music, this is not the record for you. If you are someone who digs Black Flag, the Misfits, Flipper and other heavy music—this record was made for you. We’re offering the record at the cheapest possible price in the hopes that you will be so taken with my enthusiasm and overcome with curiosity, or perhaps just want to hear this gem again, that you will just get it. Those of you who checked out my radio show, Harmony In My Head, last year may have heard some of these songs. I got a lot of mail about the Negative Trend tracks. Getting this record out has been a long standing ambition of mine and a labor of love to get over the wall. I hope you check it out and dig it. Here’s some info on the EP: Mercenaries (Shatter / Gray), Meat House (Shatter / Gray), Black and Red (Gray), How Ya Feelin’? (Waters / Gray) -- Steve DePace – Drums (Later in Flipper), Will Shatter – Bass (Later in Flipper), Craig Gray – Guitar (Later in the Toiling Midgets), Mikal Waters – Vocal -- Produced by Debbie Dub and Negative Trend, Engineered by Stu the hippy, June 1978 - San Francisco CA

Flipper – Ha Ha Ha: This is one of the first Flipper songs I ever heard. I first saw them in the summer of 1980 at the Mabuhay Gardens in San Francisco CA. The bill: The Circle Jerks (pre-1st album), Flipper and The Dead Kennedys. What a show. All the bands killed. For some reason, Rick Rubin, who owns all the Flipper songs has seen fit to keep the Flipper album Generic out of print, making it one of those “rare” CDs, which is really awful. Maybe RR should do a little meditating on that and get the fucking CD back out into the world. Anyway, this track was taken from the Sex Bomb Baby CD. That one’s out of print as well.

Roy Orbison – In Dreams: Perhaps at this point more well-known for its use in the film Blue Velvet, it’s still a beautiful and sincere song sung beautifully by one of the best things to ever happen to a microphone. This was taken from a 20 song greatest hits CD which was one of the first CDs I ever had and I have played it so many times since.

Mark Stewart – The Resistance Of The Cell: What a maniac! I don’t know much about Mark Stewart and only have two records of his solo stuff. I also don’t know much about his work with The Pop Group but I really like the records I have. The track we heard tonight is called As the Veneer of Democracy Starts to Fade. If you listen to it, you might think that Trent Reznor may have heard this record a few times at some point. That was the first thing that hit me when I heard it. I went on Amazon.com to see if there was anything I could learn in the reviews of the CD and a lot of them talked about how the band was an influence in NIN. This is a noisy aggro record. I don’t know how his previous album Learning To Cope With Cowardice sounds but I want to check it out.

DJ Screw – Aggravated Rasta: From the 3 ‘N The Mornin’ Pt. 1 CD. This CD and the one that came after, 3 ‘N The Mornin’ Pt. 2 are two of the most fucked up CDs I have ever heard and I recommend them. Ian MacKaye turned me onto to DJ Screw who has been dead for quite some time and these CDs may not be all that easy to find at this point but they are worth the search. Completely out there and dangerous music.

Eric Dolphy – 17 West: From the Out There album. Dolphy was one of the greatest American musicians of the last century. There I said it. From his contributions to John Coltrane and Charles Mingus albums, his own records are staggering. He was a Be-Bop titan. He played saxophone, flute and clarinet. He composed, toured and recorded with great vigor in his short life. If you liked what you heard, check out this album as well as Out To Lunch to start and go from there. If you are still interested, check any of the 1964 Mingus bootlegs where Dolphy is in the line-up. I think there’s a few legit releases with Dolphy but there’s some releases on labels like Magnetic that are amazing as well. Dolphy was one of the truly big men of Jazz. Not to be missed.

The Carpets – Chicken Backs: From a really cool R&B CD called Great Googa Mooga vol. 1. I have searched but have been unable to find Vol. 2. I don’t think there is one. I don’t know anything about any of the bands on the CD but they sound great. Old R&B and Doo Wop are genres I don’t know much about. All I know is I like this track. Past that, I don’t know anything about The Carpets.

The Beach Boys – Wouldn’t It Be Nice: Surf’s Up Beach Boys Fanatics!!! There will be a worthwhile release coming out soon. The 40th Anniversary Edition of The Beach Boys groundbreaking album Pet Sounds features a new version of the album’s original format taken from a better source than the one used for the Pet Sounds box set released a few years ago. I have a-b’d the two of them and there is no surface noise on the new version but no loss of frequency as far as I can tell. The new version is much, much better. Tonight we listened to the new and improved version that was sent to me by someone at EMI. Thanks JB for the hook up!

Fontaine Toups – When I Wake Up: Some of you Fanatics may remember hearing a few tracks from this album earlier in the year. I listen to this record all the time so I thought it was time to bring another track to the show. Fontaine was in the popular and prolific group Versus. I have all their records I think and they’re great but I like her solo record better than all of them and I wish she would record more. The album this track was taken from The Fontaine Toups, is on Teenbeat. http://www.teenbeatrecords.com/

Don Cherry - There Is The Bomb: From the Where Is Brooklyn? album. Years ago, I bought the Don Cherry box set on Mosaic. It’s out of print now and not all that easy to find. I got the re-issues of the three albums featured in the box because I was hoping that there would be some remastering. From reading the liner notes in the box, I can’t get any info on the mastering of the box. Don Cherry was a Jazz pioneer. If you are a fan of Albert Ayler, Ornette Coleman, Archie Shepp, and other hard and out be-boppers, the Don Cherry Blue Note catalog is right up your alley. I am sure a lot of you Fanatics are all over this stuff anyway. What a line-up on this record. Pharoah Sanders, Henry Grimes and Ed Blackwell. Forget it! You’re half way to Ayler right there!

Lou Reed – Shooting Star: From the Street Hassle album. I don’t think the critics liked this album and I don’t think Lou Reed cared, that’s good because it’s a really cool record. I used to play this album all the time in 1983. I was living at SST and we were in one of our very hungry phases and this album gave me a lot of inspiration. I still listen to this album a lot. Good Rock and Roll.

Blixa Bargeld – Somewhere Over the Rainbow: From the Commissioned Music CD. I don’t know anything about this record. I have never asked Blixa about it. I got it many years ago and was surprised I waited all this time to play something off it. Blixa Bargeld as many of you Fanatics know, is a member of Einsturzende Neubauten and was for many years, a member of Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. At one point, there was a series of digi-pack CDs from different members of Einsturzende Neubauten. I believe they were soundtracks they had done for plays and other non-Neubauten efforts. The Blixa one was the one I played the most.