From the archives: Distinguished Middle School Dance Songs

Last week, while I was doing a little grocery shopping, I picked up on Chris De Burgh’s “Lady in Red” playing in the background. I grinned with amusement as it took me back to those semi-awkward, fully sober, Middle School dance days. I began to think of some of the prime slow dance songs from back in the day and recalled a few good ones:

Chris De Burgh - Lady In Red: The inspiration for this post. Not a nice guy - check out "personal life" on his Wikipedia page. What a dick.

Boys II Men - Bended Knee: Pretty much the gold standard for slow jams at the time. Now usually heard at the NH State Liquor Store.

Richard Marx - Endless Summer Nights: More of a feel good 80s song but I bet this was played at least once at a dance.

Bon Jovi - Always: This song wins the Cal Ripken award. Played at every single dance.

Bryan Adams - (Everything I do) I do it for you: Really cheap song.

Led Zeppelin - Stairway to Heaven: No comment necessary other than your night is over after this.

Any others? Let us know...

From the archives: Free Tunes For Your Manic Monday

Nothing says "suck" like the Monday following the Superbowl. Fortunately the dudes at The Hood Internet have salvaged the day for us with their Mixtape Volume Five. I've posted a few individual hood tracks on here before, but this one is roughly an hour of continuous good times with hip hop/indie fusion. Enjoy and download here.

The Drake x Birdman x Delorean track is my favorite so far.

The Hood Internet does XX w/ Freddie Gibbs, Elizabeth Harper and Telli

Look for a new album with original work dropping soon...

The Hood Internet - VCR (feat Freddie Gibbs, Telli of Ninjasonik, Elizabeth Harper of Class Actress) by gsw

The Bluest Water I'd Ever Seen

New track and video from Teen Daze

Teen Daze - The Bluest Water I'd Ever Seen from teen daze on Vimeo.

Free Curren$y

Not cash but a free EP from the New Orleans rapper. A nice way to end your April 20th. Stream and download here.

New Beastie Boys - (double click to watch full screen)

Wow - Ad Rock, MCA and Mike D are back ... with an all-start cast of clowns to promote their new album ...

Owsley Stanley, LSD Supplier/Grateful Dead Sound Engineer Dies

I'll admit that I had no idea who Owsley Stanley was until I came across this article in today's WSJ. What a guy! Mr. Stanley directly influenced the 1960s acid rock culture by distributing shit tons of, well, high purity acid, often times for free, at concerts with the goal of introducing a new form of consciousness. Over the course of his travels, which included the UVA School of Engineering and the Air Force, he wound up becoming the Grateful Dead's audio expert: creating their sound system, introducing live recordings and even coming up with the trademark skull and lightning-bolt logo. As described in the journal:

Mr. Stanley was the rebellious scion of an eminent Kentucky family. His grandfather, Augustus Owsley Stanley, was a U.S. senator after serving as governor. The younger Mr. Stanley was described by a former schoolmaster "almost like a brain child," but was kicked out of the Charlotte Hall Military Academy in 9th grade for "getting the whole campus intoxicated" on smuggled booze, he told a biographer of Jerry Garcia, the late guitarist for the Grateful Dead.

Owsley died last Sunday at 76 after a car accident in Queensland Australia. The whole article is here.

Stream The New Strokes Album "Angles"

Right here

Sunday Night

Cass McCombs - County Line by DominoRecordCo

Take you back a bit...

Airport Bar Tunes

I was in an airport bar last week and "Eyes Without a Face" by Billy Idol came on. At the time I couldn't recall if this was actually an Idol song or some knockoff, so I set a reminder on my phone to do some research at a later date. I kind of forgot about doing that research until the reminder popped up on my phone a few minutes ago - I guess that's why we have reminders. A quick research session determined the song does, indeed, belong to Idol. What a quintessentially '80s AND airport bar song. I easily became lost in the ballad while looking around the bar and placing other travelers to the lyrics being spit out of the shitty airport HiFi system: Some out of hope, some far from home, some trying to keep the dream alive and even the dude with the mustache and indoor shades who looked like he was going on a psychedelic trip. It was weirdly satisfying and a good way to kill 5 minutes before a flight. Sweet song, too.

Billy idol - eyes without a face by breedapart2

Unlikely heroes: Creed Saves Boy From a Pack of Wolves

Remember Creed? You don't? Okay, they were a crappy rock band from a time period when music was truly suffering. In their videos, some dude was always standing in the rain singing. Not sweet.

Anyway, a Norwegian boy was walking home from school one day pumping one of their tracks on his phone when he happened upon a pack of wolves...worst. He knew not to run away so he pulled his headphones out, blasted the volume and did some screaming and the wolves turned heel and left him alone.

So yes, my headline was misleading. Nevertheless, it is likely the best piece of news and most exposure that band has had in a while. And I LOVE the fact that the youth of Norway are still rocking out to Creed. Take that Norway's future!

Much love to Steve "Big Katt" Geller for sending this over.

Destroyer - Kaputt

From the album, Kaputt. Makes me long for warm, mellow days. Just crank it all the way through and enjoy.
Destroyer - Kaputt by H+ Records

Jimmy Buffett - Injured Dome Piece

Getty Images

Jimmy fell off the stage in Sydney while wrapping up an encore and injured his head. He was rushed to the hospital. It's unclear if there is a woman to blame or if it's his fault.

Full story here: Jimmy Buffett Hospitalized After Sydney Stage Fall | Billboard.com

A new classic: Friendly Fires "Skeleton Boy"

This track has definitely been posted to the blog before but as it's 6:15 a.m. as I type this from a hotel room near Baltimore, it's doing a bang-up job of keeping me awake while I work. Great track.

Profile: Girl Talk

Excellent article profiling Girl Talk from Fast Company. Two snippets below, read the full piece here.

From Fast Company:

Gregg Gillis, the former biomedical engineer turned mashup artist, is among the most radical recyclers since Dr. Frankenstein. Performing as Girl Talk, the DJ has perfected the art of remixing the best beats, hooks, and choruses from other pop, gangsta rap, and rock artists, many of whom were left for dead by their labels.

He hasn’t won over fans and critics merely by playing with the best bits of other people’s music and performance styles. He’s sampling the most exciting ideas in the music business, too--leaking tracks, giving music away for free, making records that make no money but put thousands of gyrating backsides at his concerts--at a time when the music business is desperate for excitement.

2011 Coachella Lineup

Click to enlarge.

Teen Daze - Let's Fall Asleep Together

Check out all the sweet 70s action

Friday Beatz

Courtesy of TheHoodInternet: Das Racist & Cults. More Wesleyan dudes (Das Racist) making good tunes - or in this case, ripping the flow.
The Hood Internet - Go Hahahaha (Das Racist x Cults) by hoodinternet

MillionYoung

I dug last year's "Be So Young" EP - Still not tired of the chillwave, overly-produced, dream-pop, nostalgic, whatever you'd like to call it, sound. Enjoy.

Cosmonaut MillionYoung - Cosmonaut by Vicente P

On On MillionYoung - On On by Vicente P