This is one a Vinyl Junkyard edition of our show. In Vinyl Junkyard specials I play almost entire LPs that I found dirt cheap somewhere laying in some bargain bin at a record store. Usually the stuff comes from The Blue Arrow Records in Cleveland. This time we have two albums from the nineties. Nineties were a time where LPs were being phased out on the market in favor of CDs. Still, some important record also saw vinyl versions and today we bring you Mouthful of Violence by Big Trouble House and Moontime by Anastasia Screamed. These are not just some random albums from the era, but also some of my favorite records ever. It’s a real pleasure to introduce them to you, since the bands and the records went fairly unnoticed at the time and are often missed by the critics too. Big Trouble House are from Minneapolis, lead by the guitar player Phil Harder. After the band failed to leave much mark on the scene, he moved on into making music videos. Anastasia Screamed were from Boston. They were lead by Chick Graning. This band also failed to make much fuss on the scene, so he formed Scarce which became almost famous with their single All Sideways, but Graning suffered from an aneurysm and had a bad case of amnesia. Scarce reformed recently.
Big Trouble House – Union Feed Grain Mill
Big Trouble House – Mouthful of Violence
Big Trouble House – Cut Him Down;
Big Trouble House – Gal In Black;
Big Trouble House – President Nixon’s Grandpa;
Big Trouble House – Let’s Go To Hell;
Big Trouble House – Push;
Big Trouble House – Black River;
Big Trouble House – Valley of Rin Tin Tin;
Anastasia Screamed – Out Of The Light;
Anastasia Screamed – Stand By;
Anastasia Screamed – One Deep Breath;
Anastasia Screamed – She Must;
Anastasia Screamed – Dead In The Grass;
Anastasia Screamed – 15 Seconds of 5 Days;
Anastasia Screamed – Tricked Into Feel;
Scarce – All Sideways.
Today we start off with an Australian band The On and Ons who serve as a backup band for Paul Collins when he plays over there. But they are also a band on their own and The On and Ons Calling is their new record. The band is consisted of former members of Zeros, Stems and Hoodoo Gurus. This also made me look up Hard-Ons. It turns out, they recently had a new record called Peel Me Like An Egg, which I have overseen until now. Scott Reynolds recorded a new album a couple of months ago in his bedroom, so we check it out. Ultimate Painting are a duet from London (Jack Cooper and James Hoare) and we check them out for the first time here at the Little Lighthouse. Todd Rundgren recently teamed up with two Norwegian artists Emil Nikolaisen and Hans Peter Lindstrøm for an unusual new album called Runddans.
Today we introduce Sherwin from Lancester, PA. We also check out some new tunes from Barreracudas (Atlanta GA) and Step-Panther (from Sydney AU). Good old Keith Richards has a new single and it sounds amazingly fresh. The second part of today’s show is dedicated to my friends Žikica and SkoÄa who lost a good home to their radio shows, because their radio station was shut down. Those shows are my favorites and I can only hope that they will find a new home and a new way to continue with their work as soon as possible. We also say the last goodbye to Wayne Carson Thompson (who wrote The Letter, Neon Rainbow and You Are Always on My Mind) and the keyboard player Eric Wrixon, the founding member of Them and Thin Lizzy (although he stayed with them only long enough to record early singles).
We start off with two new tunes from Ezra Furman from Boston. Then we have a new super-duet by Neil Michael Hagerty from Royal Trux and James Jackson Toth from Wooden Wand. The band is called Hagerty Toth Band. We play a brand new tune from The Cynics, which I recorded at their live show in Cleveland. Cairo Gang come from Chicago. The brightest spot in today’s show is the introduction of the new LP Gravy for Faux Killas from Memphis, which is probably the best album that came out this year so far.
Today we go back to Ricked Wicky – Robert Pollard’s new band with his old friends. It’s already their second album this year. Umreti Fit, a band from Szeged in Hungary, has a new record Zvezde na plafonu, their first LP. Sonny Landreth, legendary guitar player from Louisiana is also back with the new record. Also in Louisiana, we check out a new singer songwriter here at the Little Lighthouse, Johnny Sansone. Other new names in today’s show are Mesa Cosa, a Mexican/Australian band and Tough Age from Vancouver CA. Finally, we check out a new song by Kelley Mickwee, out of Austin, recorded live in Cleveland.
We start off with the new Spanish duet called Los Bengala. They have a new album called Incluso Festivos. Zach Jones is a new name from Portland, Maine. Rolin comes from Cleveland and runs a cool band called Nowehere. We also have some good old familiar faces – Rickie Lee Jones and Richard Thompson. His new album is produced by Jeff Tweedy and his old band Uncle Tupelo saw a release of an interesting tribute recently. We cull out Leeroy Stagger from that tribute. Today we say goodbye to Chris Squire, the bassist of Yes and The Syn.
For some reason, I received a bunch of new records which are clearly inspired by the kraut rock – a German rock movement from the early ’70s which contained long, repetitive pieces, sometimes taking over the entire side of one LP. The new bands obviously have multiple influences, but I think that the following bands are truly influenced by kraut rock: Hypnodrone Ensemble from Berlin, Kinski from Seattle, Ancient Sky from Brooklyn and King Gizzard And The Lizard Wizard from Australia. At the end of the show, we hear a live tune by a new, young, up and coming duet from Cleveland, Archie and The Bunkers.
The brightest highlight in today’s show are two live recordings from King Gizzard And The Lizard Wizard. This Australian band played two nights in Cleveland and I was there to catch some moments with my recorder. One of the songs was brand new from what I could tell. Another hero of this show, Eamon McGrath has put out yet another of his online only albums called Shortest Ride To The Light of The Morning. Chris Stamey is back with the new record. Mark Kozelek with his Sun Kil Moon is back with the new record, probably the best one in his career. We also check out two new band, The Morons from Chicago and The Zoltars from Austin TX.
A good chunk of today’s show is filled with power-pop tunes. We start off with The Akibas new single. This band is important for the history of our show as it was the first band tune ever played at The Little Lighthouse. The we go on to Terry and Louie, surviving duet from The Exploding Hearts and their new single. Galileo 7 from Medway also has a new single. We also introduce Dot Dash from Washington DC and Belltowers from Orlando. Guadalupe Plata with their dusty rock’n’roll return with a new record without any title. And finally, we hear The Z-Boy, an awesome new surf rock, instrumental band from Rhode Island that I saw playing live in Newport, out of a pure coincidence. The best things happen when you’re least expecting them.
Today’s show is an episode in our Rock’n’roll Anthems series. Previously we featured Louie Louie, I Fought The Law, Tobacco Road, Train Kept A-Rollin’, Money (That’s What I Want). Today we go the way back to the late nineteenth century when a railroad worker John Hardy committed a murder and got hanged afterwards. The story and the event went into a legend and into a song. The song eventually made it to the records in the twenties and quite a few rock musicians found the story exciting enough to include it into their repertoire. Most notably, my favorite version of Gun Club. As it usually happens in folk traditions, they are not always historically accurate. There was also another character John Henry, who was a a steel driver who apparently defeated a steam powered hammer. For whatever reason, musically and lyrically, some musicians of the past mixed the two different characters and song and elements of one went into another. So, today, we explore these two stories and the impact they had on rock’n’roll. Most recently, Danny Kroha recorded the legend of John Henry on his new lp, so the two characters still continue to keep our attention.