Today's Cartoon and/or Photoshopped Chuckles: Special "Those John Cage Jokes Get 'em Every Time" Edition

Heh. 😎

And may I just say, and for the record, that if you find that Airplane/Mike Lindell thing a little unsettling, rest assured that so do I. 😎😎

In any case, actual music posting resumes on the morrow.

OK, These Lemon Twig Kids Are Just Getting Ridiculous!

From his just released album Only Fools Fall In Love Again, please enjoy Twigs touring bass player Danny Ayala and the utterly adorable hook laden pop confection that is his "I Don't Like Her."

Sounds very Twigs-ish, which is both a compliment and not a huge surprise, to be sure. I should add that the way the chorus takes off instrumentally, in particular, just slays me. 😎

I should also add that the album is co-produced -- wonderfully, as you can hear from the above -- by the incomparable Fernando Perdomo, the L.A. session stalwart who attentive readers will recall I first became aware of through his work with Friend of PowerPop© Cait Brennan in 2016.

In any event, you can (and should) order Danny's album as a download or on gatefold(!) vinyl over at Danny's Bandcamp page HERE.

La Fin de La Semaine Essay Question: Special "Imitation is the Sincerest Form of Obsequiousness" Edition

From the guitarist's finished basement in (I think) 2020, please enjoy Middle Aged Dad Jam Band (MADJB) and the damndest version of "Born to Run" you'll ever hear.

Okay, I stumbled across that clip by total accident over at YouTube the other day, and I lack the words to convey just how charming I think it is, the sax player's deficiency in the Clarence Clemons department notwithstanding. (And BTW, he's the drummer's kid. 😎)

In any case, if you were wondering, those guys are a bunch of previously/highly successful actors and comedians who -- in the wake of the COVID epidemic -- got together to play music and found that they had stumbled on to an alternate career.

You can find out more about them over at their Wiki entry HERE.

And more usefully at their official website over HERE.

Hey -- I think you'll find the backstory fascinating. Not to mention the video links. 😎 😎

Meanwhile, all of the above leads us inexorably to the subject of our up to date business. To wit:

If you wandered into a local bar and there was a tribute band playing there (for free) -- what band (artist) would be you be most or least hopeful it would in tribute of?

Discuss!!!

Okay, no arbitrary rules whatsoever, but let's leave The Beatles out of it.

I mean, what could be more cliched than some Beatlemania shit?

Alrighty then -- forgetting the Fab Fauxs thing, what would YOUR choices be?

And have a great weekend, everybody!!!

Today's Cartoon Chuckle(s)

Heh. 😎 😎 😎

A really cool Weekend Essay question on the morrow.

Closed For Monkey Business

Actually, closed because yours truly came back from Edinburgh (or, more likely, the plane I flew home on) with a really epic cold.

No, not Covid!!! I had my booster shot just BEFORE the vacation!!!

Anyway, as a result my work ethic has been shot to shit.

Regular cool music posting resumes on the morrow, immune system permitting. 😎

Coelacanth Discovered in Edinburgh!!!

Okay, I've used that title joke on numerous occasions here previously, but you'll get the point.

And now the short version. As perceptive readers may have already intuited, a certain Shady Dame and I have (lately) made it a sort of tradition, upon our vacation trips to various European cities, to discover at least one indigenous indie record store per town. As the aforementioned readers should recall, the most recent of these excursions was during our end of April vacay to Amsterdam, where we discovered a a fabulous little shop called Record Mania, chatted with the charming proprietor and came home with a virgin copy of a re-mastered early 70's Shocking Blue LP that I'd wanted forever.

During our just completed sojourn to Edinburgh, however, we found the proverbial horse of a different color. More specifically, a remarkable place called Avalanche Records.

Which turned out (surprisingly) to be located, a few blocks from our rather upscale hotel, in a fashionable/trendy underground shopping mall called the Waverly Market.

We shot the breeze with the store's droll proprietor, the irrepressible Kevin Buckle...

...who's been running the place (in a variety of venues) for nearly 40 years (five in its current digs) and who has an impressibly encyclopedic knowledge of all things pop. And in general we had an absolutely fabulous afternoon at the place.

Here's the aforementioned Shady Dame of my aquaintance looking through the merchandise...

...and here she is (back in the States) with the incredible Yardbirds b-sides comp -- Psycho Daisies -- she scored after scouring the store's LP racks.

I should add that we also bought a vinyl copy of Amy Winehouse's Back to Black, and I grabbed a really cool black hoodie that has the store's logo on the back (which I wore for pretty much the rest of our time in the Scottish capitol). I also gave Kevin a couple of CD copies of The Floor Models' Esprit de Floor (oh right -- you didn't see THAT coming) -- and he has since informed me that it is in heavy rotation on the the Avalanche in-store playlist.

Anyway, just a terrific afternoon; if you find yourself in Edinburgh (which I highly recommend in general -- it's a helluva town) be sure to check it out. And when you do, tell Kevin that PowerPop sent you.

Meanwhile, you can find out more about the place at their informative website over HERE; their physical address is Waverly Market, 3 Waverly Bridge, Edinburgh EH1 1BQ.

Fathers and Sons (Plus the Occasional Famous Non-Relatives)

Okay, this is like the coolest thing ever.

And the vinyl version drops, as today's kids say, on Record Store day, i.e. November 25.

What exactly is it? From the official Omnivore Records press release:

Growing up, I always loved my dad’s music. The recordings he made at that time were never properly released and only came out in limited quantities. We had the idea of re-recording some of his more recent songs with some guest artists to shed more light on his great back catalogue. Over the years we met a lot of the amazing musicians who lent their voices to this project and gave the songs new life. I’m happy with how the record turned out, and I hope it’ll turn more people onto his records and beautiful songwriting.
—Brian D’Addario (The Lemon Twigs)

The Lemon Twigs are not the phenomenon they are by accident. Brian & Michael D’Addario's father is a brilliant songwriter and musician in his own right. The Lemon Twigs pay tribute to him by producing and performing on a collection of their father’s music (with Ronnie involved every step of the way).

Written By Ronnie D’Addario features 13 tracks written by Ronnie with special guests and collaborators: Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee Todd Rundgren adds his layered lead and backing vocals to “I See The Patterns” and Canada’s Mac DeMarco leads “Love’s Won Me Over.” Sean Ono Lennon, Darian Sahanaja & Probyn Gregory (The Wondermints, The Beach Boys, Brian Wilson’s band), and Matt Jardine contribute vocals and accompaniment to others—all while The Lemon Twigs and Ronnie himself hold down the performances on these stellar tracks.

While not a “classic tribute album,” Written By Ronnie D’Addario is a testament to incredible songwriting and interpretation from artists from across the musical spectrum.

As attentive PP readers are aware, Ronnie is a wildly talented old friend and occasional bandmate of mine going back 40-plus years to our days on the Greenwich Village folk and New Wave scene, so I am tickled to death that this album (which I had no idea was in the making) is about to be unleashed on an unsuspecting world (in both CD and streaming form on December 5; I'll keep you posted on where).

Also alas, none of the tracks are yet available for preview -- I haven't heard 'em, although I know for a fact anyway that they're great (😎) -- but because I love you all more than food, here's a recent (2015) Ronnie-only original version of one of them.

Have I mentioned that this album is like the coolest thing ever?

La Fin de La Semaine Essay Question: Special "A Rose Among Thorns" Edition

Okay, I'm still decompressing from our quite wonderful Scottish vacation. So without any further hoo hah let's get directly to the subject of our new weekend business.

To wit:

...and the post-Elvis rock/pop/folk/r&b song/record you absolutely adore and couldn't live without by a major league band/solo artist the rest of whose work you otherwise couldn't give a shit about is...???

Discuss.

My pick to click? Gotta be this one.

Hey -- the freaking Cure, when I'm not giggling at head honcho Robert Smith's fashion choices, mostly bores me to scowling fidgets. But wow -- if there was a more gorgeous three and a half-plus minutes of anything in the last forty or so years, I for one haven't heard it.

Alrighty then -- what would your choice(s) be?

And have a great weekend, everybody!!!

Closed for Post-Scottish Monkey Business

Still decompressing from our fabulous Edinburgh et al vacation.

Coming tomorrow -- a genuinely way cool Weekend Essay Question.

In the immortal words of Andrea Martin as Edith Prickley -- "could be a hot one!" 😎

What I Heard on My Scottish Vacation

The charmingly monikered Northumbrian pipe virtuoso Kathryn Tickell and her infectious "The Wedding."

And Scottish folk rock band Rura with the interestingly minimalist and quite lovely "Elliott's."

By way of explanation I should add that a certain Shady Dame and I took a particularly fun afternoon trip out to the Highlands and Loch Ness the second day we were in Bonnie Scotland. And our tour guide/bus driver, a delightful gentleman named Alex McClure, had some interesting playlists of sort-of traditionalist Scottish music prepared for the excursion; the two songs above particularly caught my ear.

I should also add that both Tickell and Rura are considered in the vicinity of national treasures by their fellow Scots. And yes, the Tickell song at times sounds (amusingly) like the music accompanying a Nintendo game. 😎