Episodes

Singer/Artist Vanessa Briscoe Hay (Pylon, Supercluster, Pylon Reenactment Society) joins us for another BONUS "Mixtape Episode", where we invite a special guest to curate a mixtape for our listeners and dig into their musical selections. Vanessa's mixtape: 1. What is Life - George Harrison 2. Space Oddity - David Bowie 3. If There is Something - Roxy Music 4. Dancing Barefoot - Patti Smith 5. Dance This Mess Around - B-52’s 6. I Wanna Be Sedated - Ramones 7. Damaged Goods - Gang of Four 8. Plane...

Our 2nd foray into the rock and roll enigma that is Ween, this time diving into their sixth studio album The Mollusk with special guest and super-fan Les Norris. Pegged as a favorite by both Gene and Dean Ween - as well as purportedly being the inspiration for Spongebob Squarepants - it's a dark but surprisingly tuneful multi-genre concept album that flits from psychedelia to sea shanties as only they can. "Bring forth the mollusk, cast unto me Let's be forever, let forever be free" Songs featu...

Canadian documentary filmmaker Alan Zweig (Vinyl, I, Curmudgeon, When Jews Were Funny) brings us an album of understated, fluid funk with a subtle-but-potent message: 'There's No Place Like America Today' by Curtis Mayfield. Released in 1975 on Mayfield's own Curtom Records, it's a stunning, sophisticated - and sadly overlooked - chronicle of austere times by a true master of his craft. Essential listening. *Opening dialogue from the 2000 documentary film 'Vinyl' Songs featured in this episode:...

It's another BONUS Patron-curated episode! For this one, we asked our Patrons to send in their favorite INSTRUMENTAL song. No singers?? No problem!! Songs featured in this episode: Waltzinblack - The Stranglers; Jessica - The Allman Brothers Band; Fun To Be Happy - Love Tractor; Groovy Delivery Boy - Frank DeVol; Fracture (Live) - King Crimson; The Köln Concert, Part IIc - Keith Jarrett; La Femme d'Argent - Air; Brendan #1 - Fugazi; Pacifica - Los Straitjackets; What Does Your Soul Look Like - ...

We put the AA batteries into our Sony Walkman and fired up Berkeley California's The Motels 1982 New Wave classic 'All Four One'. Our special guest, retired drag queen and bon vivant Shelley Novak a.k.a. Tommy Strangie, brings the passion AND the knowledge as we explore the life, songs and stylings of Martha Davis and Co. Along the way we bump into Mark McGrath, Diane Warren and Wink Martindale, among others. Join us, won't you? Songs featured in this episode: You Don't Own Me - Lesley Gore; Ta...

The fourth - and penultimate - studio album by The Police, "Ghost In The Machine", is both the sound of a band ascending to super-stardom and a band tearing apart at the seams. Guitarist extraordinaire Russell Mofsky (Gold Dust Lounge, Quit) joins us as we unpack this at times bleak and at times joyful amalgamation of dazzling hit singles and adventurous musical explorations. Songs featured in this episode: Desperado - Gold Dust Lounge; So Lonely (Live 1980) - The Police; Repeater - Fugazi; Riv...

When British band Scritti Politti originally got together at Leeds Polytechnic in 1977, they were a punk-inspired collective of art students and squatters with a penchant towards Marxism. In the early 1980s leader Green Gartside scrapped all that and pivoted the band to a pop/soul sound that paid homage to American artists Michael Jackson and Aretha Franklin among others. This week we're joined by Aylesbury, UK resident Paul Marfleet as we dig into their smash sophomore album 'Cupid & Psyche 85'...

In 1974, the one-of-a-kind chameleon that is David Bowie was poised to shed his Ziggy Stardust persona for the Thin White Duke. Before that transformation, he fired the Spiders from Mars and - using George Orwell and William S. Burroughs as inspiration, crafted his nightmarish apocalyptic opus Diamond Dogs. This week's guest, Oscar Hererra (The Sleep of Reason, Black Tape For A Blue Girl), leads us on a journey through this raw, challenging and ambitious album. "This ain't Rock'n'Roll, This is G...

Our first "Mixtape" episode, where we invite a special guest to curate a mixtape for our listeners and dig into their musical selections. From the mind of Robert Price (Kreamy 'Lectric Santa, Bank O Christ, The Funyuns) we bring you 'Sir Robert's Kreamy-n-Reconstructive Brainmelt Mixtape', featuring: 1. Popcorn - Hot Butter 2. You Cant Kill Me - Gong 3. Germfree Adolescents - X-Ray Spex 4. Lisa Says - Velvet Underground (1969 live album) 5. Papa’s Got a Brand New Pigbag - Pigbag 6. Communist Rad...

Returning guest John Strohm (Blake Babies, Lemonheads, Antenna) has a strong personal connection to the record he chose to discuss, the stunning 1995 debut of Minneapolis band Polara. As a close friend of the bands founder, beloved musician/producer Ed Ackerson who sadly succumbed to pancreatic cancer in 2019 at the age of 54, John was right there during the recording sessions lending a musical hand where needed. He brings deep insight into the creation of this impressive amalgamation of blissfu...

For this BONUS Patron-curated episode, we invited our Patrons to send in their favorite Non-English Language songs. They did NOT disappoint! Songs featured in this episode: Komm gib mir deine Hand - The Beatles; Aguas de Marco - Elis Regina; Ça plane pour moi - Plastic Bertrand; Enamorado - Jay Klineman; Bemen Sebeb Letlash - Mahmoud Ahmed; Detalles - Roberto Carlos; Bomba - Jah Wobble’s Invaders Of The Heart; Malagueña Salerosa - The Tubes; Puis Je? - Kevin Ayers; Demolicion - Los Saicos; Jaan...

When Aaron Freeman and Mickey Melchiondo - better known by their respective stage names Gene and Dean Ween of the band Ween - were given full reign of a professional recording studio for their 4th studio album, they rose to the occasion and crafted 1994's "Chocolate and Cheese". This week's guest, teacher and poet Josh Medsker, joins us as we attempt to dissect this weirdly wonderful, schizophrenic slab. Songs featured in this episode: What Deaner Was Talking About (Peel Session) - Ween; (For A...

In 1991, teenage Louisville, Kentucky band Slint recorded 'Spiderland', a brooding, sinister record that helped invent post-rock and influenced a generation of musicians. This week's guest Jay Reeve (Muteant Sounds Net Label) joins Rob to dissect this darkly mysterious album. As Steve Albini wrote in a 1991 Melody Maker review: "It's an amazing record, and no one still capable of being moved by rock music should miss it. In 10 years' time, it will be a landmark and you'll have to scramble to buy...

For this week's episode, we climb aboard the rock-and-roll mothership that is Led Zeppelin and their mysteriously untitled fourth album. What more could possibly be said about this ubiquitous classic-rock staple? This week's guest Ralph Cavallaro describes how the record/band went from seminal hard rock touchstone in his youth to bloated, uncool anachronism in his college years to one of his all-time favorites today. Along the way we dig into the sonic artistry and groundbreaking recording techn...

When this week's guest Kristen McLean's parents were raising the beams of their house in Worthington Massachusetts in 1971, Crosby Stills Nash & Young's 'Deja Vu' was the soundtrack. The angelic melding of CSN&Y's voices belied the often-dark mood of the record, as the members personal struggles and the tattered remnants of the Summer of Love colored every note within. "One morning I woke up and I knew you were really gone..." Songs featured in this episode: No Irish Need Apply - Don McLean; Sli...

Formed in 1976 by husband-and-wife duo Lux Interior and Poison Ivy, The Cramps forged their own unique niche in the early punk movement with their raucous brand of rock-n-roll psychobilly. This week's guest, art gallery owner and music fan Brook Dorsch, brings us their debut full-length 'Songs The Lord Taught Us'. "Well, come on little mama, let's tear this damn place up!" Songs featured in this episode: Human Fly - The Cramps; Dark Entries - Bauhaus; Health Fanatic - John Cooper Clarke; The Bal...

Sociologist, Appalachian scholar and activist Alana Anton is a southern girl at heart, and when she first discovered The Highwomen - the debut album by the country music super-group of the same name composed of Brandi Carlile, Natalie Hemby, Maren Morris, and Amanda Shires - it immediately brought her back to her country roots. The at times gut-wrenching collection of songs is a stunning celebration of women in country music, full of equal parts high comedy and high pathos. An instant classic! ...

Singer/songwriter Greg Franco (Man's Body, Rough Church, Ferdinand) has a dark secret. Even though he came up in the early-80s LA punk scene listening to bands like Dead Kennedys and Black Flag, he's also completely enamored with the music of British pop band Prefab Sprout and it's founder Paddy McAloon. Join us as we discuss their 1990 release: 'Jordan: The Comeback' Songs featured in this episode: I Don't Want To Grow Up - Descendents; Contact Sigh - Man's Body; Appetite - Prefab Sprout; Absol...

For this special bonus episode, I asked my Patrons to send in a song they kind of love by a band/artist they kind of hate. It's: That ONE Song By That Band/Artist I Don't Really Like Got Me High! As usual, they did NOT disappoint!! Songs featured in this episode: Superstar - The Carpenters; Viva La Vida - Coldplay; Stranglehold - Ted Nugent; Crazy Horses - The Osmonds; No One Like You - Scorpions; Peace Frog - The Doors; Heard 'em Say - Kanye West; Total Eclipse Of The Heart - Bonnie Tyler; Pla...

Singer/songwriter...musician...producer...et cetera...et cetera Jim Camacho sat down to discuss a record that got him high over 35 years ago and continues to inspire him today: 1985s 'Hounds Of Love' by the incomparable Kate Bush. The songs on this record are at once dramatic, moving, wildly adventurous and undeniably Kate! "Do you want to feel how it feels?" Songs featured in this episode: Hounds of Love - The Futureheads; When The World Stops Spinning - Jim Camacho; Free Man In Paris - Joni Mi...

Emmy-winning writer Jeff Greenstein (Friends, Will & Grace, Parenthood, Desperate Housewives) knows a thing or two about comedy. So it's no surprise that a record that got HIM high as a young impressionable adolescent ALSO made him laugh. A lot. The songs on 'More of Tom Lehrer' by singer-songwriter/satirist Tom Lehrer combine wickedly-clever wordplay with an absurdist - at times dark - sense of humor that clearly influenced Jeff's future work. "And we will all go together when we go..." Songs f...

As teens growing up in Summit, New Jersey in the late 70s, NY Punk Godfather Jack Rabid (Big Takeover Magazine) and his likeminded friends would sneak off to Manhattan to catch shows by the exciting new bands and punk legends they were reading about. Even at 17 they knew Johnny Thunders and his Heartbreakers were something special, and the blistering live document 'Heartbreakers Live at Max's Kansas City' is a prime example of why they rarely missed a show. "I don't know why you just don't... Le...

In 1993, British alternative/shoegaze band Catherine Wheel paired-up with producer Gil Norton (Pixies) to create a record that fused the atmospheric beauty of their debut with a crushing wall-of-sound: 'Chrome'. The feedback-drenched tales of beauty and paranoia caught the ear of this week's guest, artist/poet Nate Levine, and he joined us for a deep-dive into the sonic muck. Songs featured in this episode: Black Metallic - Catherine Wheel; Sweetness & Light - Lush; Man In The Box - Alice In Ch...

This week, activist and co-host of 'The Muck Podcast' Hillary Dougherty takes a break from smashing the patriarchy to bring us a record that made the pandemic slightly more bearable for her: 'Punisher' by indie-rock sensation Phoebe Bridgers. It was a fun, lively conversation and no guitars were destroyed! Songs featured in this episode: Dylan Thomas - Better Oblivion Community Center; Motion Sickness - Phoebe Bridgers; Sad Songs (Say So Much) - Elton John; Waltz #2 - Eliott Smith; DVD Menu, Ga...