Your Friday Moment of THIS IS WHAT ROCK 'N' ROLL IS SUPPOSED TO SOUND LIKE!!!

From her 2013 EP Boy Crazy...

...please enjoy big-voiced farm girl next door Lydia Loveless and her jaw-droppingly great ode to the joys of having the sort of domestic dispute that, if videotaped, would have gotten you on an episode of COPS -- the amazingly honest, hilarious and fiendishly catchy "Lover's Spat."



I'm sorry, it just doesn't get any better than this.

Seriously -- this is so great, if I was thirty years younger I'd be trying to weasel myself into this band even if Lydia wasn't the lead singer.

INSPIRATIONAL VERSE: The lyrics to the second stanza and the bridge.

So don’t go running around naked by the side of the road
Honey, you look ridiculous
With that cut on your eye and your dick hanging out
Why don’t you care about us
Well, why don’t you stay for dinner or at least a late-night snack
Oh honey, I can’t relax
To know it’s just a lover’s spat

Oh excuse me, I don't think you know my father

This woman is a stone genius.

Image of the Day

From 1962 -- During one of the first live performances of his hit “Monster Mash," Bobby "Boris" Pickett is backed by a then-unknown teen combo called The Beach Boys."

Words fail me. Seriously -- has anybody ever seen this one before? I know I haven't.

[h/t KLG]

Closed for Moneky Business

Had a real oool time spinning tunes, craking wise and (if truth be told) sipping elitist chardonnay on my pal Captain Al's intertube radio show yesterday, but four hours of it really tuckered me out -- hence nothing new today.

Regular posting -- inluding a big video roundup on Friday -- resumes tomorrow.

Who Listens to the Radio?

Well, hopefully you guys.

Because I'm gonna be on my old chum Allan Rosenberg's intertube radio show Lost at Sea today between 3-7pm East Coast Time.

Over at fabulous Area 24 Radio.

You can -- and should -- stream the show over HERE.

We'll be spinning lots of interesting, offbeat and alarming tunes -- including the world premiere of yet another track featuring some idiot whose name rhymes with Sleeve Nimels -- and a real cool time is guaranteed for all.

We'll also be taking your requests and accepting threats via the e-mail, so don't hesitate to contact us (I'll be giving out the addy on the air).

So tune in, won't you?

Thanks!!!!

Your Monday Moment of a Work in Progress

From their forthcoming EP, recorded in a dank attic somewhere in the wilds of New Jersey...

...please enjoy my once and future high school garage band chums The Weasels and "A Lot Like You," the latest masterwork that will probably make their names live beyond eternity.

This isn't quite finished, BTW -- only half of my guitar solo is there, and this is a rough mix -- but I think it sounds pretty cool nonetheless. The song is written and sung by friend of PowerPop "Jai Guru" Dave Hawxwell (who also plays rhythm guitar); the Sting-like bass is by Allan "Al" Weissman; the louder rhythm guitars are by some idiot whose name rhymes with Sleeve Nimels; and the non-human drum track is courtesy of our producer, Reg Thorpe Glenn Leeds.



I should add that when Dave first presented the song to us some weeks ago, we were duly impressed with the progress of his songwriting; heretofore just about everything he had ever written sounded like 70s soft or country rock, whereas with this new opus he had graduated to a convincing impression of Mike and the Mechanics.

Weekend Listomania's Greatest Hits: Special Classical Has No Vocal! Edition

[This was one of the first Weekend Listomanias I ever put together (it originally appeared in in June of 2007, back when both your humble scribe and the world were whelps; I mean, I hadn't even met a certain Shady Dame at that point.) Anyway, if you were around during the last couple of days, you'll understand why I'm recycling it; I've made a couple of new selections and re-written it a bit, just so you guys don't think I'm the laziest gal in town. Enjoy! If possible!!!]

BEST EVER ROCK INSTRUMENTAL TRACK -- NON-PROG VARIETY!!!

[Arbitrary rule: Joe Satriani, who I otherwise have no problem with, is prog, so don't nominate him. And if you nominate that Focus "Hocus Pocus" crap I'll come to your house and beat the shit out of you for your fucking lack of taste.]

Okay, my totally top of my head Top Ten is/are:

10. Rumble -- Link Wray



If you're of the opinion, as I often am, that the quality of a rock single depends mostly on its resemblance to a gang fight, then obviously this is Ground Zero.

9. Steve's Song --The Weasels (featuring some guy whose name rhymes with Sleeve Nimels)

Written and recorded around 1970 by moi, apparently when I was listening to a lot of Stephen Stills records. Hey, I was young.

8. Beck's Bolero -- Jeff Beck



The tragedy of Jeff Beck - and I mean tragedy -- is that there's not a musician in any genre on earth who can creatively challenge him. Can you imagine the burden? Seriously, If I was him I would have committed suicide years ago.

7. Apricot Brandy -- Rhinosceros



I actually saw these guys -- who were a sort of Los Angeles studio cats supergroup -- live at the Fillmore East. Very impressive musicianship, and they still totally sucked.

6. The Carlsberg Special -- Wizzard



Roy Wood is God. End of story.

5. Perfidia -- The Ventures



Swoonerama.

4. Sabre Dance -- Love Sculpture with Dave Edmunds



The guys who spun plates on The Ed Sullivan Show should have lived to hear this. Actually, maybe they did.

3. Theme from Star Wars -- Big Daddy



John Williams' most lucrative piece of work as it was always meant to be heard.

2. Like Long Hair -- Paul Revere and the Raiders



What was that argument we were having the other week about these guys?

And the most absolutely phenomenal rock non-prog instrumental ever, it's not even a contest, is ---

1. Cobwebs and Strange -- The Who



I rest my case.

Alrighty then -- what would YOUR choices be?

The Tooth of Crime

Ian McLagan -- keyboard genius of The Small Faces/Faces and much much else -- takes a bite out of a CD featuring a bassist whose name rhymes with Sleeve Nimels.

Words, as they fucking say, fail me.

[h/t Phil Cheese]

Closed for Drug Abuse Monkey Business

All that instrumental jam shit of the last couple of days has really knocked the stuffing out of me.

Regular non-psychedelic posting resumes tomorrow, including -- unless I'm high -- a Weekend Listomania's Greatest Hits installment on Friday.

And Speaking of Headache-Inducing Self-Indulgent Jams By Great Bands Who Should Have Known Better...

...as we were YESTERDAY...

...from the Avalon Ballroom in 1966, please enjoy the otherwise fucking amazingly great Moby Grape and their improvised on the spot masterpiece overly-long inducer of psychedelic ennui "Dark Magic."

17 minutes long, I might add. Anybody seriously think the light show really enhanced the experience?

In any case, Television's instro-rock show last weekend sounded far too much like this. Minus the vocals, obviously.

Hey, If I Want to See an Instro Band, I'll Buy Tickets for the Raybeats or the Budapest String Quartet

So this weekend, a certain Shady Dame and I were privileged to attend a show -- at New York University's exemplary new auditorium at the Skirball Center for the Performing Arts -- by the legendary Teletubbies. In front of the newly back in action Joshua Light Show.

I must say, the band looked good for their age.

[Left to right: Fred Smith, Tom Verlaine, Billy Ficca and Jimmy Rip]

Okay, actually, we went to see the legendary Television at said venue with the JLS, and since I really hadn't ever seen the band at their peak, I was pretty stoked. Which lasted for about five minutes after the show started; beyond that, not so much.

The reason: Television did not perform a single song from any of their three original studio albums. In fact they did no "songs" per se whatsoever -- the show was completely instrumental-jams-only (I think I recognized one number from Verlaine's early 90s instrumental set Warm and Cool, but I'm not sure).

What was it like? Well, some of the playing was brilliant (no surprise there), and I respect them for trying something a little different. And if the idea was to recreate the experience of hearing a second-tier San Francisco ballroom psychedelic band at one of the Fillmores in 1967 (sans the pungent aroma of marijuana, of course) then the show was a complete success. Unfortunately, I've got old Moby Grape live bootlegs from that period whose free-form, made up on the spot, instrumentals sound pretty much the same as Television did last Saturday night. And the Grape's jams are just as enervating without drugs.

I for one, however found the whole experience somewhere between intensely headache inducing and a really unethical bait and switch.

Very, very disappointing.

UPDATE: A certain Shady Dame reminds me that Television opened the show with a little bit of noodling on the riff of "1880 or So" (from the third studio album); I regret the error. Also, in the interests of total accuracy, I should add that they DID encore with "Little Johnny Jewel," albeit without vocals, but technically that song was a single rather than an album track.