Somebody Likes It (Shane Bartell, Kevin Newsum, Ryan Newsum, Mark Couvillion)

We've been spending lots of time in the 70s, it seems, almost to the point of pricing shag carpeting. Oddly, Thin Lizzy's Jailbreak, their undisputed US breakthrough record and the peak of their notoriety, takes me back...to 2009, when 'Jailbreak' became my antidote to (or respite from) the endless cycle of Michael Jackson tracks on jukeboxes immediately following his passing.

"Jailbreak" (the song) always seem to cleanse the palate of the room, if only for the moment, then, and it's perhaps at least a little ironic that Thin Lizzy also featured a shooting star frontman (an unfortunate double entendre) -- Phil Lynott, himself gone too soon. There are some chunks of the Lizzy catalog that are certainly less memorable, and who could blame modern day listeners who have been oversaturated by the prominence of the tracks they know too well. What we cannot hear with fresh ears, might we still appreciate for its immediacy? Only one way to find out.

Plan your own Jailbreak on Amazon

A Few Minutes With

Ryan pays tribute to Chris Cornell AND relives the first time he saw [**Soundgarden**'s video for *Jesus Christ Pose*][2].

A Current Affair

There's witchcraft in this video for [**Fleet Foxes**' new single *Fool's Errand*][3].

I just exhausted myself with all the tittering I did coming up with “Jam Puns” writing the previous version of this. Then, when I finished composing it in all of it’s majesty, I sat back to gaze upon my masterpiece…And then it struck me I FUCKING HATE PUNS! There is a burning hatred inside of me for puns. Tell the truth though, I now can see the allure in writing them.

Anyway,we reviewed the album “All Mod Cons” by the Jam. Now I’m getting all nervous that I’m inadvertently dropping puns everywhere. Better get out while I’m ahead.

Mixtape shows are funny (beyond whatever shenanigans actually happen during the taping itself): you tend to think about the songs you're going to add to the show via the unique prism of that song's application to a given theme.

For our Labor Day Mixtape Show, we decided (cleverly? You decide-) that we'd bring to bear songs specifically about Work, Birth (or Babies) and/or British Parliament (though that Labour has a U in it). Who knows if it works, but it sure does make the searching and ensuing chatter greater than dull. Pull up your favorite chair, grab the beverage of your choosing, and hold on.

Also, We've created a playlist for this mixtape so that you can enjoy all of the songs in their entirety. You can check that out on Spotify or on Apple Music.

##In This Episode:##

• R.E.M. - Finest Worksong
• Dolly Parton - 9 to 5
• The Beatles - Birthday
• Me First and the Gimme Gimmes - Isn't She Lovely
• They Might Be Giants - Seven Days of the Week (I Never Go To Work)
• Eddie Rabbitt - Driving My Life Away
• Loverboy - Working For The Weekend
• Spoon - The Agony of Laffitte
• Huey Lewis and the News - Working For A Living
• Sam Cooke - Chain Gang
• Donna Summer - She Works Hard For The Money
• Sex Pistols - God Save The Queen

Serendipity is, apparently, a real thing. Mr. Matt Munoz, longtime friend of the show, had as much (or more so) of a need for this album to show up in his life just when I re-discovered it and just so happened to contact Shane a week before we were already set to cover this record.. A sorely somewhat-forgotten genius record that bridges Radiohead and every misbegotten relationship you’ve ever had. It’s forlorn, and it’s beautiful. And we talk about it in this week’s Somebody Likes It.

As always, we welcome your questions, comments and suggestions at messagesomebody@gmail.com. Holla!

This week we took on LCD Soundsystem and Ryan and I disagreed a lot.

But I’m WAAAAAAYYYYY less interested in that discussion than I am in what we listened to and talked about during A Few Minutes With.

Purchase "Sound of Silver" on Amazon

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### A Few Minutes With ### My good friend Matt Munoz joined us in Mark’s garage for our weekly fun times. Seeing as how Matt was the guest we politely decided to let him pick the song for the intermission. Matt thoughtfully picked ShanDozia and his epic R&B Ballad “Pink Pannies”. See, Matt used to work for Warner Brothers records and apparently at one point they noticed their R&B Catalog was a little weak, so they brought on ShanDozia. Quincy Jones and whole lot of heavy hitters seem to have been involved. You know, just listen to the show, Matt explains it a lot better than I can. And when you are done, please get on the internet and google that shit, cause your life is empty until you hear the full version of [“Pink Pannies”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qCrYR2rJ9o).

Coming Up

Next Show: It’s a little bit of a surprise but I will say that Kevin is back! So that’s fun. Happy Holidays and shit.

SON!

Pioneer of "trucker country," Jerry Reed, turns out, falls in my sweet spot. The man was rapping (albeit with a country twang) before that was a thing, could finger-pick his way out of a wet burlap sack, and was pretty damn funny while doing so.

I generally don't care for my music and humor intertwined (see:Tenacious D), but apparently if the songs deliver, caution to the wind.

He is probably best remembered for playing second-fiddle to Burt Reynolds in the "Smokey and the Bandit" movies these days, but the man could deliver a hook.

Can't promise that my good buddies (breaker 1-9) on the show will rise to my level of enthusiasm, but that's their loss. Tune in and figger' out why Jerry Reed's "Essential" compilation earns its moniker.

That's a good 10-4,
Ryan

SON! You best be gettin' on down to Amazon to pick this one up!

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A Few Minutes With

[**Ray Stevens** - The Streak][2]

A Current Affair

[**Portugal. The Man** - Feel It Still][3]

Adam and the Ants, perhaps the birthplace of the of the Sexy Revolutionary War Guy costume, is our focus as we welcome back our full complement of goofballs back into the fray. There's lots to discuss - Malcolm McLaren, dream journals, Jerry Reed comes up for some reason, and a girl who is reviewing all of the LPs in her husband's "Stupid Record Collection."

All in all, it's not hard to see why this act became a thing in the nascent days of MTV, and why, after all these years, it still sounds fun. And you can wager that revolutionaries dressed like Adam Ant might not have won most wars, but  then again, you probably need to ask yourself, who wants to fight with all this dancing going on?

Pick up Adam Ant's Friend or Foe

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A Few Minutes With

[Richie Havens - Follow](https://youtu.be/IEazNNJEcm0)

A Current Affair

[Sasimi - Not The Time](https://youtu.be/T61l0Qlo-1E)

Start by forgetting all you think you know.

Every day is Christmas when you're an LA Garage scene musician, and the songs are presents you can't unwrap quickly enough: they tear through them with reckless abandon, and like musical easter eggs, there always seem to be more in waiting, right around the corner.

That same fertile musical playground encouraged the inception of Cory Hanson, who cut his teeth backing linchpin acts like Ty Segall and Mikal Cronin, and the first couple of releases by his act—Wand—only cemented that association. So of course Hanson did something next that no one saw coming. He scrubbed his entire approach.

When fans are used to you spitting out two fierce records a year, contemplating a new release to the tune of Plum comes as a surprise. A retooled lineup, thoughtful variances, and shared songwriting duties confounded expectations further. But when the sunlight hits needle on vinyl here, the results are, well, noticeable.

Join us as we pull back the curtain.

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Some additional steps for you to take:

• Check out the video for Plum
• Check out the video for Bee Karma
• Buy This Week's Vinyl on Amazon

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A Few Minutes With

[**Broken Bells** - The High Road][4]

A Current Affair

[**Phoebe Bridgers** - Motion Sickness][5]

This week, we spend some time getting to know chaos. Both in the body of The Yeah Yeah Yeahs Fever to Tell, and in Mark’s garage. Both an existential and recorded. But damn, sometimes I think you need to unravel a little bit so you can feel alive! Sometimes you need to stare into a yawning chasm in order to appreciate feeling alive. I should know, cause I felt a little more alive after recording this week’s show.

---

### A Few Minutes With ### Also, there’s some Blink 182 and Sarah Jaffe. ### Coming Up ### The Chairman stops by. We review “In the Wee Small Hours” by Frank Sinatra. We’ll finally get into the 1950’s. So don’t miss that shit. Laterz…

It would be hard to overstate the prolific nature/work ethic/buxom beauty/absolute sweetheart nature of this week's subject of Somebody Likes It, one Ms. Dolly Parton, with her 1973 record "Jolene."

If anyone has any doubt as to the grandeur of what they're about to encounter, just take a look at the cover--which if one weren't lucky enough to encounter the over-the-top (literally, this hair has to be seen to be believed) fashion of 1970's ladies in the South, well, you're in for a treat.

It's too bad that Ms. Parton only has time to write more songs than virtually anyone else on the planet, found an amusement park, act in mostly-credible movies, and somehow not manage to come off as completely full of herself. Which she probably, by all rights, ought to be by this point. and hey, maybe she is--I've never met the lady--but I doubt it. Tune in and decide for yourself.

--Ryan

Purchase "Jolene" on Amazon

A Few Minutes With:

The Weakerthans - "Sun In An Empty Room"

A Current Affair:

Temples - "Certainty"

This is the end…my only friend…the end…
Nah, not really. Kevin will only be gone for a few weeks. But in the mean-time, Mark Couvillion will be providing his voice and ideas and garage to the cause. Carry on my wayward son!!! KEVIN!!!!

Ok, now that that is over with, onto what the hell we talked about this week… Real Estate and their most recent album “Atlas”. I’ve actually already written a HILARIOUS synopsis of this week’s episode, but I woke up today to an email from Chris Cox telling me:
“Hey, you sent me the wrong document. This is just the Bat Out of Hell one again.” I checked that shit out, and he was correct, that is what I sent him. And the Real Estate sum up was nowhere to be found. Awesome.

Purchase "Atlas" on Amazon

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### A Few Minutes With ### So anyway, Mark sat in for his second guest host gig, we all talked about how much we liked the band, and then we went on for a long ass time about [“White Room” by Cream](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKyGn_uxkPU) during A Few Minutes With.

Coming Up

We discuss “Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space” by Spiritualized.
BEST. ALBUM. TITLE. EVER. See you then

As I write this, I am currently consuming the Jim Jarmusch documentary about the Stooges, "Gimme Danger." This means nothing, other than the fact that it turns out the Stooges hung out with Nico, and that ridiculously beautiful German model had a hold (artistically!) with two massively influential bands. She is most known, of course, for collaborating with the Velvet Underground on their first record. Which leads me to my real point: Lou Reed.

Lou led the aforementioned VU, and by most accounts, was a cantankerous asshole. Let that not lead one to assume that he was an untalented cantankerous asshole, for he was not. In 1989, Mr. Reed released the solo effort "New York." Suffice it to say, some love love this record, others quite less so. Critics were pretty hip to it, but they aren't always right. Without giving away too much, I'll just say that check in to a spirited debate about a document of pre-Giuliani New York, and decide for yourself.

---

You can buy this album on Amazon, don't you know.

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A Few Minutes With

[**A Tribe Called Quest** - Can I Kick It?][2]

A Current Affair

[**Sufjan Stevens** - Tonya Harding][3]

You know what’s cool? When you go out to a bar and some drunk asshole is going on and on about a record, or tv show, or movie they REALLY love and you just have to sit there and take it. Well, imagine 3 drunk assholes doing that, and you’ll be hot on the case of what we are doing the next 3 weeks with a thing we call “I Like It” (really selling it huh)? This week, I’m up and I picked The Smiths-The Smiths, the debut album by my favorite band The Smiths (duh). A fine time was had by all. Not sure if it makes for good radio, but any time you are talking about the straight up weirdo tortured genius that is Morrissey, interesting tidbits are bound to pop up.

NEXT WEEK ON SOMEBODY LIKES IT: Ryan is up to bat and we take aim at Travis-The Man Who…and Matt Munoz stops by, and so should you. —-Shane

Andy Partridge and Colin Moulding may have written some of the best songs of the 70s, 80s, and 90s that most people have never heard. They teetered on commercial superstardom for years and potentially could have gotten there had it not been for Partridge's crippling stage fright that caused the band to stop touring in the early 80s. Heading to the studio with a new-found freedom to create music without concern for how to reproduce it live, XTC began to push the envelope of their sound. But it would take a few albums for them to establish the right formula that would result in 1986's Skylarking. In the middle lies The Big Express. At times disjointed with angular expression and fluid poppy hooks, this album starts off with a chug and slowly puff puffs it's way to a grinding halt some 44 minutes later.

This album seems polarizing among XTC faithful with some calling it one of their best works and others putting it at the bottom of their catalog. For us, we all pretty much agreed; this does not match the power of Partridge's and Moulding's work that came both before and after its release, but that does not make it any less important in telling the full story of this band from Swindon.

XTC - The Big Express

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A Few Minutes With

[The Cardigans - Carnival][2]

A Current Affair

[Viagra Boys - Sports][3]

HAHAHAHAHA! Well, don’t get me wrong I had to suffer through it too, but still HAHAHAHAHAHA! This week I picked Styx’s 1983 back-masked classic Kilroy Was Here as my torture device, err, album to listen to. You all remember Killroy Was Here right? It spawned the huge hit Mr. Roboto a song that has aged as well as a yogurt cup left out in the sun. I highly recommend everyone take a listen.

Buy "Kilroy Was Here" on Amazon

A Few Minutes With

This week we did something different for A Few Minutes With. Instead of watching a music video, we watched the 10 minute long mini-movie Styx opened their shows with on the tour supporting Kilroy Was Here. Ok, now obviously I was fucking around when I encouraged you guys to listen to the album, but I AM NOT when I tell you to watch this movie. It is Grade A unintentional humor.

A Current Affair

Ryan picked Do You by Spoon for A Current Affair.

Coming Up

Up Next-We celebrate the return of Dad Kevin with the ultimate Dad album, Sukirae-by father/son duo Tweedy. See you around

Somewhere, embedded in the occasionally cracked warble of Evan Stephens Hall (which sounds like the name of a room they might play), Montclair, NJ's Pinegrove caught stride with 2016's Cardinal release. They presumably spent much of the rest of the year touring and floating on the accolades of reviewers' laudatory sentiment; and to be certain, there are some high points at play, including one that begged an ironic comparison to a Tim Conway picture.

But we wonder why some can't follow that twangy doesn't always equal country, that unpolished tracks are occasionally built that way on purpose (to the consternation of some), and how wearing your influences on your sleeve can sometimes work wonders, or occasionally seem a yarn not yet fully woven.

Listen and weigh in yourself: send your thoughts, suggestions and manic ramblings to messagesomebody@gmail.com.

Somewhere around the time dinosaurs walked the earth and Prince Charles started wearing Lady Diana’s clothes, I spent a summer working in radio.

Those were odd days — or nights rather — plugging in commercials in the middle of the night to avoid the radio tax shows we were running (aka ‘ratings juggernaut’), and I used to take chances, mostly to keep myself awake beyond the darkness. Occasionally, that meant thumbing through a reservoir of old LPs from the station’s previous incarnation as an Album Oriented Rock enclave. Among those ruins lay the quirky sheen of Steely Dan, and from there on, my wee hours took to Fagen and Becker’s brand of jazz-rock urban dystopia.

This week’s show featured a fog machine, a giant Godspell canvas, dissection of the differences between jazz and what’s “jazzy,” and a steady drumbeat of vitriol from one of us (Shane cough cough Shane).

In between, we talk about the band construct that was Bow Wow Wow (and how young that singer was…her mother was not pleased), and Shane leaves us on “An Island.” Tune in to find out what that means.

EXCERPTS FROM SHANE BARTELL’S DIARY

Dear Diary,

I’ve never felt sadistic until right now. I’ve told Kevin
and Ryan that the next album I’ve chosen for us to discuss is Bon
Jovi-“Slippery When Wet”. I know we’ve all been friends for many
years, and I know that SHOULD provide some goodwill…but will they
actually/eventually forgive me? Can I forgive myself for making them
cram that nonsense into their ears…we’ll see.
—Shane

---

> **Dear Diary,**

After attempting an initial listen, I now know that the
goodwill I was counting on might not be enough. Even now, I’m steeling
myself for a second dive into this cesspool. So far I’ve only been
able to stomach 2 songs. I’ve already gotten a few late night texts
from Ryan about how much he hates me for making him do this, and while
I think he’s kidding (mostly), I really can’t tell anymore. —Shane

---

> **Dear Diary,**

What was I thinking? I thought this would be funny, and
though it is, I can say with all seriousness that I wasn’t counting on
the fact that I ALSO HAVE TO LISTEN TO THESE SONGS. My bones feel
sore, like a low grade flu. —Shane

---

> **Dear Diary,**

Why does Jon Bon Jovi constantly reference the “bottle”?
—Shane

---

>**Dear Diary,** > > I’ve finally made it through all the songs. I feel kind of worn out. Exhausted. Well, drowsy really. I mean these songs aren’t tiring as > much as they are boring. Don’t get me wrong, they are bad, and > offensive, and confusing, but the overall effect is one of “change the > channel” rather than run and hide. I’m left with a lot of questions, > hopefully we’ll address many of those when we record. I know a lot of > people really love this album, and after surviving a listen to the > full record I’m ultimately left with a question. WHY? And also > why*——(unintelligible)—-* > *—Shane*

There’s more where that came from, but I fell asleep at the keys so we’ll just leave it there.

Purchase Slippery When Wet on Amazon

---

### Coming Up ### Next week was supposed to be Hole-“Live Through This”, but at the 11th hour Kevin changed his mind, and we had to navigate the mines that make up “Straight Outta Compton”…(not quite a pun, but kinda punny!!!) See you in 7 days*…Shane*

Let's say you have a band. It's mostly you, though you bring in a rotating cast of characters to help you fill it out. You don't love touring, but do love snapping together pop punk ditties with a surgical top-down-in-the-summertime sonic aesthetic. You tend to pair these with dada-esque videos, and somehow it makes sense.

Though it's your act, your last name is a nom de plume.

You may understand the difference between the 'emo' and 'scene' scenes, and you may churn out catchy harmonies like they're growing on trees, but beneath the surface of incandescent melodies lurks melancholy.

That's where we find Jade Lilitri and his erstwhile ensemble, Oso Oso. Let's put the needle in the groove, together, and unpack what it means when an optimist drinks 'half empty cups.'
(Recorded February 14, 2020)

Listen to the album on Spotify

A Few Minutes With

Matthew Sweet - Thought I Knew You

A Current Affair

Dermot Kennedy - Outnumbered

It occurred to me a little while back that all the rap albums we’ve talked about were all released before 1990. I thought maybe we should step up our game here, so I picked one that came out a few months ago Tetsuo and Youth by Lupe Fiasco. I had been aware of Lupe when he first started putting records out, but had lost sight of him in recent years.

As Ryan put it “This is the best album we’ve talked about that I’ll probably never listen to again”. But you can make up your mind on that yourself.

Pick up "Tetsuo and Youth" on Amazon

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A Few Minutes With

Ryan continues his stellar run of picking great videos from the 80’s with his choice of We’re Not Gonna Take It by Twisted Sister.

Coming Up

Next week we will be joined by Marcus Rice as we discuss Heaven or Las Vegas, a Cocteau Twins joint. Also, I have a feeling Creed might pop up; it’s been a little while since I’ve discussed Scott Stapp. Ciao!

Remember that shitty song Everything Zen by Bush? Awful awful song. Well this album isn’t that. It’s like the opposite of Bush. Zen Arcade (the seminal 1984 record by Hüsker Dü) landed in our laps this week, and let’s just say it definitely wasn’t what we expected it to be. I (and the rest of those people that talk into mics on this show) had previously only been familiar with Bob Mould’s post Hüsker Dü output, and that was a world away from THIS weird-ass hardcore punk concept record. Spirited discussion of it ensued.

Hey, remember that time last week where I said I made everybody listened to Heart’s All I Wanna Do Is Make Love to You? Oh yeah, that was actually this episode…OOOPS.

Next time on “Somebody Likes It”… I can’t make the show, and the discussion was finally about an album I liked: Tahiti 80’s light as air, sugary French Pop confection from 2000 Puzzle. So tune in, I certainly will, if for no other reason than to see if they talked shit about me. Bon Nuit, Shane

You catch that? I slipped a little France-y talk in at the end there. Sometimes being me is a heavy burden.

Hey ya’ll! Have you heard about this Elvis dude? Me too! Didn’t he shake that “pelvis” on the T.V. that one time?

I, of course, had been aware of the myth of Elvis Presley, but I had never actually “listened” to him. To me the whole myth of Elvis (one word) had completely superseded any actually enjoyment of the music Elvis had put out there, other than the parts of hits we all collectively know (we can’t go on with…you ain’t nothing but a…wise men say…). He was larger than life, and his larger than life persona was more than actual music to me…as much as The Beatles or Nirvana are for some people, 60 years after Elvis dropped his first record Elvis Presley.

I don’t think we all loved this record equally, but we all loved it, if for no other reason because it is incredibly obvious after listening to it that you can see the launching pad of what popular music would become for the next 50 years and that is humbling… But we also all loved it caused the shit is just good.

Couple of weeks ago I had my first real Early 80’s “After-School Special Teenager Vs. Dad Fight” with Chris Cox! I was like (and I’m paraphrasing, even though it would be so easy for me to pull up those e-mails if I weren’t so damn lazy), ” WHAT THE HELL?! Chris Cox, get out of my room! Maybe I totally got the order of episodes F’d up, but even if Doves is a week away from when I said it would be WHO CARES!” And then Chris Cox was like “No problem. Well just try and fix it if/when you can.” And I was like “YOU’RE NOT MY REAL DAD!” and then I totally forgot to fix it. Which is pretty embarrassing when you consider that I don’t smoke pot..or do sacrifices… or jump out of windows in an attempt to fly, or anything else people were really worried about in those after-school specials…

Fine. Maybe it was my fault this once. Whatever fault that might be…maybe this time I should just own up to it. You win, Chris Cox. We listened to Doves The Last Broadcast this week, and not Iggy and The Stooges Raw Power…you win this time. But you have to admit that I sure do have a tin ear for dialogue. Rest assured I will soon be submitting my “Shitty Re-Enactment Dialogue Resume” to Investigation Discovery…

Buy "The Last Broadcast" Over Yonder Along The Amazon

Coming Up

(for sure this time): Stevie Wonder Songs in the Key of Life.

This week we crack the 50’s with Frank Sinatra’s ode to lost love In the Wee Small Hours. As I suspected going in, it was way too easy to get caught up in the myth of Frank Sinatra, and it took a lot of concentration to stay on task and discuss the actual album. But let me tell you, we did it. We got it done. I think you would have expected nothing less than the literal and minimal accomplishment of what we are supposed to do.

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### Coming Up ### We steer back into comedy in celebration of The Moontower Comedy Festival, and we have JT Habersaat a REAL LIFE COMEDIAN sit in with us as we discuss Kyle Kinane’s Whiskey Icarus while we drink REAL LIFE WHISKEY. So yeah, should be fun.

You'll never accuse Archy Marshall (better known as King Krule) of waxing trite: Marshall, the artist by way of producer, has always been as versatile and fearless as he has been precocious. He forged a bumpy, art-indulged childhood into unpredictable, relentless artistic visions as a young adult, and it seems to be taking him places: with The Ooz, his latest release, he's constructed a potentially rich opus of personal and sonic deconstruction. It's not an easy listen, but then again, neither are those shady corners of the darkest recesses of our mind that help make us who we are. It's alchemy, and it's messy.

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Some of the videos we watched during this episode:

• Check out the video for Dum Surfer
• Check out the video for Czech One
• Buy This Week's Vinyl on Amazon

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A Few Minutes With

[**A Tribe Called Quest** - Dis Generation][4]

A Current Affair

[**Third Root** - Kawhi][5]

The year was 1985. Orwell’s postscript.

Fitting then that a record emerged from a band so maligned originally that they took to stealing sets from opening acts, so full of angst that to this day they try to reposition remnants of tales of violence at early shows, and who then might have known the result. Despite the fact that it kinda sounds like it was recorded in a burned-out warehouse, this record, nevertheless, is the lynchpin between The Velvet Underground and the shoegaze movement of England in the early 90s. Beneath all of the circumstance, buried in the gauzy haze of proto-shoegaze, pop songs and hooks with undeniable charm.

This week we cover a wide variety of topics, like the Brothers Reid, the confluence between bands we can’t seem to separate in our minds, and the stilted, occasionally simplistic takes shared in reviews of records that are, in retrospect, the foundations for entire movements or scenes, not — hey! — unlike this week’s record, The Jesus And Mary Chain offering PsychoCandy.

Buy "PsychoCandy" from Amazon

Also, tune in as we weigh the question of ‘How Deadpan is Deadpan Enough?’ (Answer: we’re not sure), the efficacy of giant drumsticks in our A Few Minutes With segment (starring Hall and Oates), and the hilarious by way of spot-on Mikal Cronin video Turn Around — which lampoons Natalie Imbrulia’s 1997 hit cover of Torn. Confused? Don’t be. Grab the edge of your seat and join us as we wander down (and wonder about) memory lane. Wish that Shane had been able to join us, as I’m certain that he’d have plenty to spill on this one…

This is what happens when your studio is in the house you inhabit with your bandmates, you’re bitter (or maybe just tired) about record labels and smarmy A&R guys, and you notice the onset of what has to be middle age, or at least the realization that for all your effort, maybe this thing that you’ve loved all of these years just doesn’t love you back.

And then The Meadowlands drops, the founder of Pitchfork loses his collective shizz and writes a glowing review that can’t help but pique the curiosity of the masses. Tune in for the twists and turns that happen next.

Got a question, comment or suggestion for the show? Hit us up at messagesomebody@gmail.com

Welcome to another riveting installment of Somebody Likes It. Wherein our heroes brave the beginnings of another endless Texas summer heat wave to bring you beautiful musings on the 2009 inaugural release from London’s Fanfarlo, Reservoir. Ryan spends the first 20 minutes speaking into the wrong end of the microphone. Kevin learns us on how Ted Leo & The Pharmacists went from garage band to music superstars overnight through the miracle of musical theater. Ryan wraps it all up with the catchy, if someone annoying, Spirits from The Strumbellas.

Next up… join us for our retrospective Memorial Day Mix Tape show as we take a look back at some of our favorite one-hit-wonders. Until then!

Courtney Barnett sure is blowing up these days, so of course we had to jump on board, ’cause you know us. Hell, we even listened to a Taylor Swift song during A Current Affair this week. Not that I’m comparing Taylor Swift and Courtney Barnett, Barnett is Australian for goodness sakes! Oh, and they sounds nothing alike. If I were to compare their similarities I would say it’s kind of like comparing Slayer and The Smiths. So, kind of soundalikes, but also not at all. Lots of people throw around Bob Dylan comparisons when they are talking about Courtney Barnett and Ryan is one of those people.

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### Coming Up ### Next week Ryan is bringing in a guest and we’ll discuss The Yeah Yeah Yeahs and their first full length, Fever to Tell. We’ll reconvene here so I can tell you all about it.

At this point it feels almost antithetical to what we're worrying about in 2022 to talk about the pandemic, like we’ve come to regard it as some sort of distant, fuzzy memory. The scourge wasn't that long ago, and if you judge by my last trip to the supermarket, some folks are still sweating the outcome.

A few months back Ryan and Mark and I put together our pandemic mixtape show, a glorious (and occasionally weepy) montage of the feels we found during those times. But Shane couldn't make that taping, and he proposed that we record a sort of adjunct episode, a Shane-centric one, if you will.

So here we are, dialing up a sublime and occasionally hysterical batch of Shane's memories, from the 'What the hell did I just see' of Thundercat to the modern buzzy throwback of Bachelor to Run The Jewels (which gave me occasion to tell my ACL-TV story) to the nerdy upbeat bliss of Dayglow.

And more. Because pandemic records were totally a thing, and so was pandemic listening. We reveal the escape where we can find it.

Listen to the Spotify Playlist

Watch The Videos

Tamar Aphek - Crossbow
Run The Jewels - Ooh La La
Sharon Van Etten & Angel Olsen - Like I Used To
Anderson .Paak - Lockdown
Thundercat - Dragonball Durag
Goat Girl - Sad Cowboy
Billy Eilish - My Future
Sylvan Esso - Ferris Wheel
Dayglow - Medicine
Bachelor - Stay In The Car
Clairo - Amoeba
Haim - Summer Girl

Being the grandson of the progenitor of 20th Century Country doesn't give you a free pass to the music hall of fame–unless we're talking about the Country Music Hall of Fame Museum in Nashville, it probably gets you a couple of free tickets there–but one thing it apparently give you is an incredible genetic tendency toward extreme musical talent. We were a little divided on how well we think that talent comes across on Straight To Hell, but with a tip of the hat to his Grandfather's legacy, "Three" packages up a little something for all of us.

Hank Williams III - Straight To Hell

---

A Few Minutes With

[Earth Wind & Fire - September][2]

A Current Affair

[Flight of the Conchords - Father and Son][3]

Usually when we do these mix-tape shows, there is considerably more fun and frivolity to be had (though there is plenty of that to be found in this episode). By now, you guys know “the drill”…we pick a bunch of Bowie songs, and discuss them. Just felt like this would be a way we could honor his life through the prism of Somebody Likes It.

There are a few musical artists that nobody hates. Willie Nelson, Bob Marley, Van Morrison. Marvin Gaye. Jimi Hendrix. Janis Joplin. Billie Holiday. Even if you don’t want to listen to them, you still kind of love them. Even if it’s a begrudging love, you still love them. Admit it.

Stevie Wonder is one of those artists.

This album should have been a much more challenging album to listen to than it was.
We talk all about it this week…

Get "Songs In The Key Of Life" on Amazon"*

Coming Up

Kevin goes on a trip, and the idiots run the asylum again.

It's hard to escape your own predispositions, and come to think of it, that's probably why we call them that. We each bring the tapestry of our unique experience into the ear we lend to a record, and it's as important as the record is itself in determining our ability to fall for it. Music can be a complicated bundle, but falling in love with an act is always collaborative. The listener, by the very act of listening, participates.

And so we find ourselves at the doorstep of Whitney's debut release Light Upon The Lake, and Shane Is Not Having It. He struggles to abide the vocal register of Julien Ehrlich (which, admittedly to some, can scan a little Muppetastic), but half of us see the late afternoon sun shining through the Laurel Canyon tinged hills and the Wes Anderson backstory and bask. Ryan makes the point that in an age of digital singles this record is, most assuredly, an Album.

They've got a new one in the can and the dates have been lined up and it's supposed to drop in August. But if you want to see where Whitney started the conversation, look no further than here. And let the light in.

Find it on Amazon

A Few Minutes With

[The Oak Ridge Boys - *Elvira*](https://youtu.be/nGKatCAQed0)

A Current Affair

[Katie Toupin - *Magnetic Moves*](https://youtu.be/6hBFPzy4haw)

Ryan made it on time this week, and he came through the door with AMAZING video from the 80’s tucked under his arm. But more on that in a minute. I came through the door with a bundle of pre-packaged Buttery Nipple shots, and let me say they were exactly as delicious as you might think.

For our album this week, Kevin picked “The Modern Lovers” 1976 Eponymous album. All I had known about The Modern Lovers prior to this listen was that Jonathan Richman was the main dude, and all I knew about Jonathan Richman prior to this listen was he was in that movie where Ben Stiller got his dick stuck in his zipper. But I’m sure glad I got the chance to listen to it.

Buy "The Modern Lovers" on Amazon

---

### A Few Minutes With ### For A Few Minutes With, Ryan brought us [“Rock You Tonite”](https://youtu.be/fR0j7sModCI) and he is 2 for 2 with mind blowing videos from the 80’s (the other one being Van Halen’s incredible “Pretty Woman”. This video is often said to have essentially ended Billy Squire’s career, and having seen it I can see why. I HIGHLY encourage repeated viewings.

A Current Affair

I Chose “Crush” by Tahiti 80 for A Current Affair, and we answer the question “Are they still a band?” (hint-the answer is yes).

Coming Up

Ok, we’re super excited because next week Chris Cox is guesting on the show and he picked Sonic Youth’s 1990 record “Goo” for us to discuss. I’m sure hi-jinks will ensue. See you then.

Well, we gone and done it. Got in bed with ole Kenny G. and did us a jazzy record. Sounds like a bunch of fucking Mr. Rogers Going To The Land Of MakeBelieve-ass bullshit if you ask me. Ryan was able to give it his highest approval rating “I didn’t hate it”…you’ll have in to see how the rest of us felt about it.

NEXT UP: Ryan found a random Hank Williams record. Tell you more about it next week…Shane

Otis. In addition to being one of those artists that one can cite by first-name only, can be included in the great pantheon of those that nobody doesn't like. Possessing arguably the best voice of his generation (if not claiming the mantle "voice of his generation"), Otis Redding, tragically, left us way too soon.

Somehow, however, I had managed to never listen to an entire Otis Redding record from start to finish. Ladies and gentlemen, I have rectified this egregious oversight.

Laid down in one 24-hour recording session like the man knew he was on borrowed time, Otis Redding Blue sounds as immediate and timeless as it did in its heyday.

Found within, an artist at once in command of and comfortable with his own moment, with both arresting and even humorous results (like when he riffed his own lyrics to the Stones’ “Satisfaction"..and the band used his version years later).

One could claim unrealized potential from most any artist (even bold ones) who die tragically at 26, but even that’s not a sure thing here: how could unrealized potential ever sound so complete? Lend an ear and let’s find out together -

Oh, and the worst Neil Diamond song ever makes an appearance. So, there's that. Which still gives me a broad smile

Pick up this week's LP on Amazon.

Also this week, we spend A Few Minutes With a familiar tribute to an M@M-loving alien and his "Heartlight" as only Neil Diamond could sing it.

A Current Affair brings us a silvery haired roller girl Angel Olsen singing "Shut Up Kiss Me".

Marc Bolan went out like a Roman candle or a speed bump or in some such way an incandescent rock star dies at twenty-nine, and left in his wake a glitterbomb of glam stardust and swagger a mile wide and a few albums deep.

It's hard to overstate his impact: T Rex enjoyed a run from 1970-73 where they charted like the Fab Four. Eleven singles in the UK top ten, among them 'Get It On,' cornerstone of Electric Warrior, touchstone of myriad covers since.

Weird stories abound: Bolan and Bowie once painted their shared manager's walls and scavenged outfits from dustbins together, and years later Bolan grabbed camp and androgyny and sexy sheen by the scruff of the neck. It's very easy to get this kind of thing wrong, but there is something no doubt fundamental at play here. It is, as Ryan suggests, both 'dirty and sweet.' The flashpoint of an attitude.

Bolan was a guy that couldn't drive but owned several cars and died in one. Life and death are funny sometimes. But in the time we're here, there's still time to start something. Something that echoes and reverbs through the ages.

(Recorded May 30, 2022)

In This Episode:

A Few Minutes With:
Roger Miller - Dang Me

A Current Affair:
NKTOB (Feat. Salt-N-Pepa, Rick Astley, En Vogue) - Bring Back The Time

Listen to the album on Spotify

So, to be obvious about it, we talk about Canada here, like a LOT.

Entirely too much. The Guess Who will do that to you.

All of the usual and a few unusual bits are trotted out. We are aware, and we are fond of Canadians. But the deep dive in this case is kind of unavoidable. Apologies to all the Gords north of the border. Maple! For all my friends.

We canvass the practice of the forty-seven minute drum solo, what it's like to sound a third angrier lyrically than is necessary, fake zombies, and something that comes across like Elvis covering Van Morrison.

This band represents another one of those acts who rocketed up the charts, encountered weird touring issues, and was typically driven by a couple of core dudes and a rotating cast of players.

The public took notice.

Tune in as we examine a quirky and occasionally accidental ascent.

Listen to the album on Spotify

A Few Minutes With

Chemical Club - Spring

A Current Affair

Lana Del Ray (ft. Father John Misty) - Let The Light In

HEEEEEYYYYYY!!! We’re back! No, I’m not the Fonz, but I just saw a bumper sticker with that on it, and it made me get a good feeling inside. Mostly, cause the Fonz was supposed to be a TOUGH DUDE, and he was just so god damned cuddly.

Ok, on to the business at hand. This week we listened to “Electr-O-Pura” by Yo La Tengo. I liked it quite a bit. Kevin a little less so. But Ryan? Let’s just say somebody took over the first part of this podcast like a drunk fat guy working on a plate of ribs. In fact, I’ll let him tell you a little about it.

“On this edition of “Somebody Likes It,” the “Somebody” who “Likes It”
is me. A lot. It would be hard to overstate my love for Yo La Tengo’s
1995 release “Electr-O-Pura,” but on this week’s podcast, I definitely
give it my best shot. I love this as much as I do “The White Album,”
“The Queen is Dead,” or “Fables of the Reconstruction.” If you know me
well, you also know that that’s saying a lot. Understandably, Shane
and Kevin were less enthusiastic about this record, but, to be fair,
it’s a pretty high bar to reach my level of fandom. In any case,
“Electr-O-Pura” is a testament to the bond one can make with a work of
art when one must travel the roads of northeast Indiana, measuring
homes for a carpet store (not to be cliche). To me, it’s a perfect
record. Except for track 13, “Attack on Love.” That song blows.”

Yeah, he’s not wrong about that. Stay far far away from that.

Purchase Electr-O-Pura on Amazon

---

### A Few Minutes With ### Ok, what else? Well, this week s intermission is [“Turning Japanese” by The Vapors](https://vimeo.com/71701204). We talk all about masturbation rumors, and how many greatest hits albums you can build around one song.

Coming Up

All right. Well next week, on this cycle of albums we love it’s my pick: My Bloody Valentine’s “Loveless”…beautiful beautiful music. See you then!

Well it’s week one of “Let’s re-visit other albums by bands we’ve discussed before”. Cause you know, we’re are lazy and unimaginative. Or to take the party line, we want to go back and see other sides of bands we’ve talked about before. We’ll do this for a few more weeks, all leading up to our first GIANT MEMORIAL DAY MIXTAPE SHOW.

One thing I’ve discovered is that Yo La Tengo leads to a somewhat sedate show. Let’s see what you guys think.

Buy "Painful" from Amazon

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### Coming Up ### We continue our trip down memory lane (as well as Matador Records circa the mid 90’s) with a spin of Brighten The Corners by Pavement.

RONNIE JAMES DIO.

It’s nearly impossible to speak the man’s name in any manner other than in all caps.

And yeah, the Brothers Newsum met with their ally Shane Bartell in Kevin’s un-air-conditioned lair in order to drink flagons of mead (or chalices of American craft beers) and tell tales of their fallen King, Ronnie James Dio, he of the mighty voice and the tiny legs.

Ok, I’m already tired of that schtick. Let’s just say it was only fitting that we discussed “Holy Diver” while sitting in a garage. The humble American garage, where so many Dungeons and Dragons games have been played over the years to a soundtrack of Dio. Not in Kevin’s garage mind you, just in a bunch of other ones.

During the course of the show we discovered Ronnie James Dio had an early career as a Doo-Wop singer. Which is kind of mind-blowing. The music wasn’t half bad, but as it’s so rare, we weren’t able to rustle up any tracks to play on air, so you’ll have to look it up yourself.

Purchase Holy Diver on Amazon

Tahiti 80 are nothing if not pleasantly contradictory, or, at least, that’s what we’re more or less led to believe after basking in the warm glow of their debut album, Puzzle. They shared an affinity for indie bands when singer Xavier Boyer and bassist Pedro Resende met at university, and that affection for American stylings led, of course, to a band that sounds, well…completely French.

We unearth a few nuggets along the way, from the fact that Fountains of Wayne’s Adam Schlesinger was (ahem) instrumental in contributing, to the fact that Tore Johansson produced the record in Sweden, and there is a clear kinship that feels Cardiganesque. They’re also rather funny (see Mr. Davies), and a somewhat fey, but these guys know a hook when they find one, apparent on Heartbeat.

We regale you with tales like the time Ryan and I chatted them up after a show at Austin’s late lamented version of Emo’s (the inside room, which never saw a health inspection it could pass…or care to).

Saddle up, and bring a beret.

Well, we fucking did it. We went ahead and recorded a show without Kevin. The only adult “Somebody Likes It” has really known thus far. I wasn’t sure that Ryan and I could hold the motherfucking jalopy together, but god was willing and the creek didn’t rise (and with a liberal dose of help from Mark) we got it done!

WE DID IT!!!!! (Cue America the Beautiful at an ear-splitting volume. And little shiny shit falling from the ceiling)
We discussed “Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space” by Spiritualized. Along with the best damn album title ever, this thing is a pretty solid listen! I guess we made fun of Ryan’s choice of snacks (again) and started getting used to recording this thing in a new garage.
Oh and wait. I forgot about this week’s “A Few Minutes With”. Well, not as much forgot as punched myself in the god-damned forehead in an attempt to forget. And here’s where stuff gets kind of complicated. See, I had just assumed that Kevin, with his DAD HUMOR and SADISTIC HUMOR had, as his final pick for a month or two, given us the hilarious-for-half-a-listen-two-summers-ago “What Does The Fox Say”, to get in one last sadistic swing. Well, turns out, Mark thinks that shit is HILARIOUS. So, I guess that seals the deal. Mark is just as much the voice of Adulthood as Kevin ever was. Except Kevin never had an animatronic fox that danced around his garage and sang the song. So I guess Mark has him beat there.

So, my pick next week. We will get back to the 70’s with Shuggie Otis and his incredibly influential album “Inspiration Information”. At some point a Gwen Stefani song will pop up. See ya then…

Air Miami! Before Kevin brought this one up it had long ago been pushed to the sidelines in my brain. I love/hate it when we bring up stuff that directly puts us in a musical paradigm. I just feel as though music (if it’s worth a goddamn) isn’t the sole provenance of the young… There are 12 year olds out there wearing The Smiths and The Doors shirts; 12 year olds that still have crushes on Elvis Presley, John Lennon and Frank Sinatra. But there are bands that are so of their era that, while they were making great music, are so of their moment that they completely date anyone referencing them (Velocity Girl anyone?).

Air Miami is one of those. I had never listened to their fey/twee, simple yet gorgeous songs. They paved the way for the (in my opinion) much better fey/twee songwriting of Belle and Sebastian/The Cardigans/The Shins… but they, in an “only could have happened in the 1990s” way, combined a convergence of irony and syrupy that made complete sense at the time.

I have a hard time navigating my day if I have more than 2 or three things to accomplish in an afternoon. I do best when I have an entire morning to decide whether it’s gonna be a t-shirt or polo shirt day. So when I read about this Ty Segall motherfucker putting out like 20 albums in the last 5 years, I kind of wanted to punch him in the face. Not just because of his feverish work ethic, but because nobody that puts out that many songs in such a short period of time can possibly write any songs worth a damn (editor note: except Robert Pollard).

But then I listened to “Manipulator”, and I have to say I was wrong. I mean the man did take 14 months (I originally typed 14 years, which really would be the opposite of what I’m getting all worked about here) to get this one done, so there’s that, but I went back and listened to some of his earlier stuff, and it’s good too. So now I want to punch the motherfucker in the face for a whole other reason.

Well we talked it all out in the garage, really hugged it all out cause everybody seems to LOOOOOOVE Ty Segall. I took the opportunity to be a bit of a crank, but for the most part all was well with the world.

Purchase Manipulator on Amazon

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### A Few Minutes With ###

This week we start including our new segment “A Few Minutes With” as an intermission in the middle of the show. For those of you unfamiliar with the new segment, it’s essentially the same idea as the “BIG SHOW”, except we take a single song and talk about it for 10 minutes. Usually with a video so we work in discussion of that too. This week we kick it off with William Shatner’s AMAZING rendition of “Rocket Man” Watch the video.

Ok, that’s it for now. Next we listen to Vampire Weekend’s eponymous debut. I like that one too. See you in the funny pages (somebody please tell me what that means)…

My Bloody Valentine’s seminal, revered work “Loveless” is lots of things: a swirling miasma of sonic assault, the birth of the legend of Kevin Shields’ madness (which saw the record make its way through nineteen studios and damn near bankrupt its label), and a layered, and above all, loud approach to song-making. So I guess what it is more than anything is a good story, and we love those.

Shane’s sitting this one out with some sort of sickness, which is I guess what happens when your eardrums have been bled clean out and you have to lie down, lest you lose your proverbial shit. In his stead this week is our friend Phil Ajjarapu, who shares a story about eating cheese and crackers with BB King, about the difference between the way we soak things up in our youth (as opposed to when we’ve been worn down over time) and about the influence of this record that seems, in some ways, to be more than the sum of its parts.

Ryan rebounds from last week’s love-in with Yo La Tengo, just in time to wonder if he “gets” this LP, even though Shields’ seems to have recorded with at least one of his heroes, and perhaps more. We even wonder about the phenomenally bad idea of Trey Anastasio’s Phish covering this record in its entirety for Halloween (which, fortunately, didn’t happen), and press on about what makes a song work, and what it must be like to have to try to decipher and catalog lyrics you think you may have heard in a live recording session, and then transcribe so that whatever version of “tortured genius” (if you buy the platitudes) might live on.

That, and we talk about Skee-Lo, self effacing diminutive rap staple.

Somewhere along the way, Phil’s dog Molly eats a pencil in my garage.

Purchase "Loveless" on Amazon

It's pretty common in our collective rear view to gaze upon the halcyon days of early March 2020 and chuckle about our earnest belief that this COVID thing? We'll be past it in a couple of weeks.

Of course now, in a story that's been beaten into a fine mist, we know the pandemic had other plans.

It is with tongue planted firmly in cheek that I suggest that this development did manage to affect the pursuit of podcasting.  At least it did ours.

We really like to sit down in person as we can—it just makes for a livelier show—and talk music. So we waited. In the time since, Shane's gone back into the studio, so when we did decide to reconvene, Kevin, Ryan & Mark connect for this episode.

We offer you the SLI pandemic recap mixtape, where we consider the tracks we've met since we've not been meeting. From the forlorn to the fanciful, it's a grab bag of what's kept us company throughout as the months piled up.

Like the needle dropped in the groove, you've got to start somewhere -

 

Recorded in October of 2021. To listen to the songs featured in this episode, checkout our Pandemic MixTape Spotify Playlist.

We had limited purview.

Bandwagonesque was the record we knew, framed by the apparently unforgivable historical fact that any band with any album might edge Nirvana's Nevermind for an Album of the Year designation. That happened. Some still haven't gotten past it. Voting on things brings controversy.

But this isn't that album. It's not even that argument.

Here we canvass Grand Prix, widely regarded as perhaps the pinnacle of Teenage Fanclub's jangly alt-pop catalogue: not so breakneck as the racer on the cover might suggest, not as European either, come to think of it. But it does sound like a band accelerating in pursuit of the act they're meant to be. Breathtaking, dynamic, harmonious. Buckle up.

Teenage Fanclub - Grand Prix

---

A Few Minutes With

[Bronze Whale - Shrubbery][2]

A Current Affair

[Interpol - If You Really Love Nothing][3]

As far as it goes with hand claps and cowbells, the majority of people are 2/3 of the way there. With Shane rejoining the podcast after a brief sabbatical, we felt it was a good time for another mixtape episode. But don't fear the reaper, we've collected 12 great tunes that showcase (or don't) the percussive beauty of skin on skin and wood on metal bovine accessory. Enjoy!

---

Round 1

###[Close To Me][1] - *The Cure* ### This is the first song I can remember noticing hand claps. I mean of course, I had heard them in songs before, but they are so obvious in this one, not to mention I first heard this song around the age when I started really paying attention to music.

###Hair Of The Dog - Nazareth ###
This song could have easily been substituted for Blue Oyster Cult's "Don't Fear the Reaper" in the classic Walken SNL sketch, as it features the the most over-the-top employment of 70's cowbell to ever emerge from a cannabis-fogged van. Scotland's answer to AC/DC--I would so totally go see them today if they toured together--even if Nazareth's bass player is the only remaining member left over from this era.

###Your Life Is A Lie - MGMT ###
Not exactly what you would immediately tag as a "single" from indie rock giants MGMT but the video certainly has legs. The solid thunk of the cowbell (or perhaps just a lead pipe) transcends the stereotypical 70's rhythmic standard heard everywhere, including through some of this podcast. You can thank acid for this one.

###Stars and Sons - Broken Social Scene ###
Sometimes the handclaps resonate more when you have to wait for them, and that's exactly what happens with Stars and Sons -- this is Broken Social Scene at full swagger, and the handclaps here serve as an exclamation point, culminating the building tension within the track. No bubblegum to be found.

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Round 2

###[Nothing'severgonnastandinmyway(again)][5] - *Wilco* ### A great song off of a great album. *Summerteeth* is criminally underrated. The handclaps in this one aren't as prominently featured as other songs on this list, but they are just right.

###Hey Ya! - OutKast ###
I don't give half a shit what the rest rest of the guys around the table care about this song, as it is pure genius to my ears--to the point that I actively searched my radio dial incessantly for it at its popular zenith. This is catchy as all-hell, the video delivers in spades, and marked the high point of a double album (which, if we're "being honest" was really just two solo records sewn together). Also, it features hand-claps.

###Lowrider - War ###
There's a real root of Chicano and Cuban percussion throughout this gem and the cowbell features prominently thus. Performed by the band War, who also gave us hits like "Spill The Wine" and "Why Can't We Be Friends?", it seems difficult to imagine anyone who has not heard that punchy trumpet riff at least a dozen times.

###House of Jealous Lovers - The Rapture ###
You will not be surprised to learn that James Murphy had a hand in production here, and to that extent this sounds like the sibling of a long lost LCD Soundsystem release. At the time the band felt a dance song might alienate their fans, but why? This track is a calorie burn waiting to happen. Both cowbells and handclaps join the party.

---

Round 3

###[Cecilia][9] - *Simon & Garfunkel* ### What can I say, the patron saint of handclap songs, somebody was gonna need to pick this one.

###Stuck In The Middle With You - Stealers Wheel ###
There is so much to love about this song/video, from its 70's bell-bottom majesty to its literal interpretation of being stuck between a clown and a joker (although--party game--guess which one is which). This also features both cowbell and hand-claps, which gives it a double-whammy for this episode. I have my doubts, but it would appear that Kevin also spontaneously picked out the solo artist that this band spawned.

One last thing: I would be derelict in my duty if I didn't give away the spoiler that there are no ears severed in this. Deal with it, and just go re-watch Reservoir Dogs.

###Groove Is In The Heart - Deee-Lite ###
When I was a sophomore in college, my buddy Hondo made up his own lyrics to this song called "Move Your Shopping Cart", with the chorus ringing out "I'm Krogerin' for my mother". It's an earworm that often sidelines my brain for days at a time with a nice, driving (and likely sampled) cowbell keeping it all together.

###Clever Girls - Paul Carlberg ###
It seems appropriate to note the omnipresent Swedish songwriting tradition here, but we spend precious little time discussing up and coming songcraft in that regard...those who pen the smash hits get all the ink. For his part, Pelle Carlberg knows his way around a ditty, and this buoyant track with the overly complicated name brings us home.

If you had told 17 year old Shane that he would barely even remember who The Darling Buds were 20 years later, I’m sure he would have just tried to get you to buy him beer…

Kevin…or Keving, as I originally wrote (pretty sure that’s his AD&D Paladin character…look, if you people are unhappy with my bullshit “funny-pants” routine then fire me), took the week off because he was busy feeding his family getting a new job and visiting Chicago (that’s the most exciting excuse I could come up with), so we had perennial fave guest Matthew Munoz jump in at the last minute…He suggested we talk about The Darling Buds – Crawdaddy.

It was a solid nostalgic record. Pretty much the consensus was “Oh Yeah! I remember that band!”

Flashback with "Crawdaddy" Over 'Round Amazon

Coming Up

Kevin returns. We listen to music. I try not to get hit in the face cause I act like a 7 year old (Offer still stands, you are welcome to write these things)…To quote Shirley Temple “On the good ship lolly-pop”

Hello my little chickadees, and welcome to “Somebody Likes It”…the show that takes a slippery idea and wanders around aimlessly, all the while attempting to keep that idea as slippery as it possibly can be.

Now, there’s a couple of ways to view this concept. The easiest target to hit, and also the closest to our original intention, is that the 3 of us will drink copious amounts of liquor and talk about an album that, while very important to a lot of people, none of us have really spent any time with. This doesn’t mean that said record is a cult classic, nay dear reader, as our intent is quite contrary to that line of thinking.

Our idea is to dig into music beloved by a swath of humanity, but not necessarily us; which is not to say we don’t like the music, or that we’re unfamiliar with the music. Rather, the 3 of us want to become more familiar with it…imagine you’re sitting in a garage with your 2 best friends and somebody opines “Hey, you don’t really know the Kinks, cause you never really listened to a Kinks album all the way through”. And then everybody runs out and listens to a Kinks album all the way through before the next sitting around the garage stuff…

But there is another lens through which to view this idea, and, well yeah it’s pretty much the same as the first. Get drunk and talk about music.

I have to say, these first couple of episodes are standing on newborn baby deer shaky legs; we’re still feeling this stuff out, but I will tell you as the weeks have gone by, we are gaining strength…

With appropriate little fanfare, here are your “hosts”:

SHANE BARTELL

Shane Bartell plays some instruments and writes “songs”. Some things you might find interesting about him: he has a scar on his left middle finger knuckle from trying to bust into (successfully!!) his dad’s “marijuana storing toolbox” when he was in middle school. When he was in 9th grade a dude gave him the shittiest tattoo ever (and that person should have known better). Music? Just fine by him.

KEVIN NEWSUM

Kevin Newsum’s toe started tapping somewhere around the LBJ administration and never stopped. He managed to unearth Sgt Pepper from beneath an onslaught of minstrel-friendly effluvia his parents hoarded, and from then on twangs and beats were never far from earshot. He’s found diamonds and dung in most every genre. He’s also a professional nerd (though there’s more to it than that), executive producer of a show in its 14th year at SXSW Interactive, and incurably curious regarding the next big sound. He is fond of the riffing.

RYAN NEWSUM

Ryan Newsum is a self-professed, life-long “music nerd”. Having spent time mastering the undeniably sexy French horn during his adolescence (that’s right, ladies–marching band!), subsequent years have seen him dabble in the music business in several capacities: radio intern, artist manager, club booker and promoter. These days, Mr. Newsum has come to realize that the best way he can contribute to the rich tapestry of the music world is to have drinks in his brother’s garage, chatting with his two best friends about iconic records.

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A few things you should know about this show before before you dig into it:

• Shane inadvertently created a drinking game. Every time Shane says the word “exactly” take a shot…and feel his dignity slip away one drop at a time…
• The Pavement song we reference is “Stereo” not fucking “Shady Lane”.
• Yeah yeah, we all know all about Ayn Rand and her bullshit Libertarian philosophy. But we don’t really care about how we mis-stated, or didn’t get something right…that shit is BORING.

So grab a Chalice and join us…we welcome all comments (except ayn rand or conspiracy theories), rest assured you are in fact wrong and we are right, but we still can’t wait to read your opinions…bring it.

Purchase Rush's 2112 on Amazon

Welcome dear listener to a tale of the macabre…a tale that will surely cause shivers to run up and down your spine! A story so boring it might cause you to rip your own eyes out!!!

We fucked up the RUN-DMC show that was supposed to be this week’s episode, and one that we allude to on multiple occasions on this week’s actual show. So that episode is DEAD but will be soon resurrected/re-recorded for next weeks installment…a tale of the un-dead indeed…

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### A Few Minutes With ### Instead this week you get the return of guest Matt Munoz, the [craziest video of the 80’s (courtesy of Van Halen)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JcB-BRSnlf8), and the debut of our new segment “A Current Affair”, wherein we discuss a song released within the 12 months preceding the show. For the inaugural segment I picked [“Bridges” by the New Zealand duo, Broods](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0U48jwC8cZU). Let’s see if you catch the twist at the end of the video cause these fucking knuckle-heads sure as shit didn’t.

ALSO! We talk about the Jellyfish record, “Spilt Milk”. I had previously scorned Jellyfish because of their stupid early 90’s clothes, but turns out, they weren’t as bad as their clothes were.

Pick Up "Spilt Milk" on Amazon

Coming Up

NEXT UP! PROMISE! RUN-DMC and “Tougher Than Leather”
See ya’ll on the Flip Wilson side.

Kevin keeps getting ideas. This week, he suggested that in honor of The Moontower Comedy Festival, an event here in Austin that draws comedians from all over, we listen to (then discuss) another comedy album. Some of you may remember that when Kevin wrapped up his paternity leave a few months ago, for his comeback record he chose a Dimitri Martin record, which while fun, was a little challenging to discuss.

This time around he picked Whiskey Icarus by Kyle Kinane and we had REAL LIFE COMEDIAN(and friend of Kyle’s) JT Habersaat on the show to help us out. That proved to be a great idea and I think you guys will agree.

For A Few Minutes With I chose the R&B classic Everyready Man (“just call me 24 hour Dan”) from Lakeside, and then Ryan had us watch a video in which a cute high woman wanders around in search of an Egg Mcmuffin which pretty much sums up the video for Stoned and Starving by Parquet Courts.

All right then. What’s up next? Oh yeah, the next 3 weeks we are gonna re-visit bands we’ve talked about before, each one of us picking a different album to discuss. Next time it’ll be Painful by Yo La Tengo (that’s a Spanish word, that’s why it sounds weird). Catch you later,

It would seem that I couldn’t rest until we’d covered the other of the mighty triumvirate of proto-punk bands (see also: Iggy and the Stooges, The New York Dolls), and thus unearthed this 1969 classic-to-many.

I won’t get into it too much here, but all I can say at this point is…balls. Balls for having your debut album recorded live. Not “in the studio” live first-takes, but a genuine live performance (although, if memory serves, it was a mesh of two nights). But also, balls all the way through, as these dudes were clearly of the take-no-prisoners and also fuck-you-The-Man! You can’t tell me what to do!

Detroit clearly had some shit going down back in the day.

Before Ozzy Osbourne was a stammering reality show punchline, he really underwhelmed Lester Bangs, and there's something to be said for that, historically speaking.

Black Sabbath's eponymous initial record was recorded almost in one sitting on its way to defining a new genre, one minted, in part, by the fact that one of the members' metal shop accidents necessitated a wholesale change in his play, that ended up informing the overall "heaviness" of the metal. Heavy metal was, in fact, created to some degree by actual heavy metal.

What the album lacks in track numbers it may make up for in personality, and even old Lester came around eventually. He may have called Black Sabbath "like Cream, but worse," but there was no denying how this record spoke to certain dark corners of the metal community, both then and now. Tune in and find the flashpoint.

Black Sabbath - Black Sabbath featuring the song "Black Sabbath" is for sale

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A Few Minutes With

[**Weird Al Yankovic** - Fat][3]

A Current Affair

[**Soccer Mommy** - Your Dog][4]

A couple of years ago I used to go to happy hour at a bar where the beautiful Scottish bartender was fond of listening to Poison, Warrant, Ratt and countless other mid-80’s hair metal bands. I never could figure out how that kind of music aroused passions good or bad. Well, after listening to Poison’s Open Up and Say Ahh I still feel that way, but I can’t say the same for Ryan and Kevin…step inside and get rocked won’t you?

By any measure, mixtapes are always an exercise in nostalgia. In fact, whenever one of these milestone shows pop up and we start paddling the raft to Mixtape Island, we can't help but share stories about the time when we made a mix for someone, and all the ensuing nuances: the sequencing, those tracks that you'd since forgotten that stopped you cold in the moment, and lastly (but not unimportantly), how it went over.

It’s probably best that we’re not eighteen forever. Evidence to that effect: the simple mixtape doesn’t quite cut it for us anymore. For this show, we each picked a track from the 70s, 80s, 90s and 2000s to get to know a little bit better, with curious results. If you think you know someone -- really know them – imagine what they’d add to a mixtape made especially for you. I guarantee the real thing will throw you curveballs.

Here’s to our first 100 episodes. And eye openers we can't yet fathom -

Round 1 - The 1970's

Hall & Oates - ”She's Gone”

So these dudes didn't want to do it like the record label suggested, so they got a couple recliners and a devil costume, smoked a bunch of weed...and we get this small miracle. -- Shane

Gilbert O'Sullivan - ”Alone Again, Naturally”

Bar none--the most depressing song ever recorded, Gilbert O'Sullivan's "Alone Again (Naturally)" nevertheless spent six weeks (non-consecutively!) at number one in Billboard's Hot 100 for the U.S. in 1972. Carried by a buoyant melody and just the most tragic lyrics ever committed to tape (seriously--check out the karaoke version online), this is truly a fascinating listen. Feel kinda bad that I didn't cede this one to Shane, as he has a bit of an obsession with this tune. --Ryan

Elvis Costello - "Watching The Detectives"

For a hot minute in the 70s all of London was agog over Reggae, and you can definitely hear some of that influence in Elvis Costello's "Watching The Detectives." Costello had yet to break, was living in a flat somewhere in London, and had been listening to The Clash for hours, which he initially hated, then grew to appreciate. And then, of course, he wrote "Watching The Detectives." The world is funny sometimes. --Kevin

Boomtown Rats - ”I Don't Like Mondays”

Although it only hit #73 in Billboard Hot 100 for 1979, “Mondays” found the number 1 spot in the UK, Ireland, and Australia that year. Proving once again that, as much as Americans like to claim their Irish heritage, unless it is green and can get them sloppy drunk they don’t really embrace things Irish. --Mark

Round 2 - The 1980's

The Beach Boys - ”Kokomo - Live”

This piece of shit was a number one hit for The Beach Boys, after which, they promptly stopped giving any more shits. There is a video from the 80's, but I highly suggest you go looking for the footage shot on an I-phone at their 50th anniversary show. Bonus! Whichever one you choose will have John Stamos in it. -- Shane

REM - ”Orange Crush”

Knowing that we we had a mandate to find these songs on a list-of-100 whatever, I managed to track down REM's 1988 genius-level video for "Orange Crush" at #53 of 100 on Billboard's 25th Anniversary of their Alternative chart. Lushly directed by artist Matt Mahurin (whose work hangs in various impressive galleries), this video stands as a one of those rare works that one could just pause at any given point, print, and have an excellent addition to one's home decor. Assuming, of course, that one were looking to accent the furniture with Vietnam War-era imagery or children's antics. --Ryan

Eddie Murphy - "Party All The Time"

If you've ever wondered what the height of fame looks like, take a couple of minutes of your day to watch the fawning mob hanging around the control room for Eddie Murphy's "Party All The Time" release. Rick James, who wrote the song, spends lots of time slowly pushing up the console volume (not sure how that helps, exactly) and the rest of the folks in the studio look equally eager to please and nervous that someone might find out that they're not supposed to be in there. Lots of head bobbing. --Kevin

Laid Back - ”White Horse”

The take-away for me from Laid Back’s “White Horse” is that there are really only two things you need to know: 1. The prerequisite for being rich is being a bitch; 2. When making the choice of achromatic equine transportation, the smaller stature of the pony is preferred. --Mark

Round 3 - The 1990's

Meatloaf - ”I Would Do Anything For Love (But I Won't Do That)”

Michael Bay. Beauty and the Beast. -- Shane

Aqua - ”Barbie Girl”

Earning the distinction of #8 on Everyhit.com's "Worst Songs of All Time," "Barbie Girl" (1997) by Denmark's Aqua somehow managed to beat out Billy Ray Cyrus's "Achy-Breaky Heart" by one slot, and that's some rarefied company. More inexplicably, this band sold 33 million records. Also, they were sued by Mattel (for obvious reasons), and the video is really stupid. You are welcome. --Ryan

Bel Biv Devoe - ”Poison”

The New Jack Swing movement occupies that tiny blip on the historical horizon after hair metal's last drummer had finished playing in the rain and before the world became awash in flannels, earnestness, and Grunge. This leaves New Jack perhaps feeling a little like a stopgap movement, but one not without its triumphs, chief among them Bell Biv Devoe's "Poison.” Listen for the dope beat. Watch the video for the outfits. Is there a blizzard about to happen in the inner city?  --Kevin

The Bloodhound Gang - ”The Bad Touch”

Anytime my faith in humanity is on the up and up, I only need to turn to these sexist, racist ass-hats to be reminded not to take human-decency for granted. Luckily, this song never topped #52 of the Hot 100, but just the fact that it made it north of 100 gives me pause. --Mark*

Final Round - 2000's

Kanye West - ”Touch The Sky”

You can watch Kanye West in an amazing red white and blue jumpsuit try to jump a rocket over a canyon. Will he make it? -- Shane

LCD Soundsystem - ”Daft Punk Is Playing At My House”

Because Rolling Stone magazine had to make an appearance here eventually, the 'aughts list "100 Best Songs of the 2000's" (#78) has yielded us "Daft Punk is Playing at My House," which I love dearly, and Shane hates with equal zeal. I am incapable of not (at the very least) head-bobbing and singing along to this tune, even if at least one of my colleagues just doesn't get it. C'est la vie... --Ryan

Midlake - ”Roscoe”

Mark noted that it would have been nice to wrap up this show's proceedings with a listen of Midlake's "Roscoe.” That's not what happened, but that didn't keep us from soaking up the sunny vibes and yearning intent from Midlake's second release. For whatever reason, this track seems to bubble up with indie types every so often to reignite conversation. Easy to see why it pops up on top 100 lists of the 2000s.  --Kevin

The Avalanches - ”Frontier Psychiatrist”

Sure… I wasn’t super confident in my ability to wrap the show with something the entire gang could latch onto. However, this video just does something to you when you watch it. Seemingly appearing out of a horrible Bavarian acid trip gone south, Australian group The Avalanches pantomime an amazing composition of samples from Canadian comedy duo Wayne and Shuster and a host of 60’s and 70’s music. In the end, we all walked away with smiles on our faces. --Mark

Next Time…

Our good friend Matt Muñoz is back and this time he takes over the show. Join us for both kinds of depressing songs from The Smiths' Louder Than Bombs.

At this point, it can be difficult to separate the legend of Joy Division from an honest account of either of their (intentional) releases, but here is what we know: on the eve of their first American tour with The Buzzcocks, frontman Ian Curtis hung himself in his kitchen. Technically, that's where Joy Division ends.

The rest of the band, in the intervening years since, have gone on to great fame as New Order, but that hasn't extinguished the fervor over the band they were -- the twitchy, angular, frenetic gyrations of Curtis, set to increasingly haunted lyrics, and seasoned with the jaunty bass lines of Peter Hook, the buzzing syncopated guitar riffs of Bernard Sumner, the precise beats of drummer Stephen Morris. Their ascent from kids at a Manchester show, blown away by the first Sex Pistols gig -- to seasoned, genre-defining post-punk outfit, is well documented.

Of the two records, the final one, Closer, foretold looming clouds on the horizon. But how does it hold up, beyond the Manchester scene, the kid with HATE spelled out on his coat, and a bass guitar for 40 quid? Sit a spell and find out -

Pick up Joy Division's Closer on Amazon

A Few Minutes With:

J.Geils Band - Centerfold

A Current Affair:

Kendrik Lamar - HUMBLE.

Hi. Are you ready to be confused? Yes? Good, because I sure am. On this week's Somebody Likes It, we cover The Yardbirds' 1966 LP "Roger the Engineer." Also known as "Over Under Sideways Down." Oh, and also known as "The Yardbirds."

If that weren't confusing enough, about half of this record is sixties ground-breaking psychedelia, and the rest is Chicago-style mid-twentieth century blues.

This band spawned the careers of Jeff Beck (on this record), Eric Clapton (not on this record), and Jimmy Page (also not on this record). Should be monumental, right?

In fits and starts it is, but we don't all agree on this. Before I give away the store, just know that there's a lot of "there there," except where there isn't. Feel free to be as annoyed/intrigued/entertained as I am.

Get your own lead guitarist and your own copy of The Yardbirds over at the Amazon.

A Few Minutes With

You're so vain, you probably think this [**Santigold** song *I Can't Get Enough Of Myself"][2] is about you.

A Current Affair

We all really like the sound of this [**Big Thief** single *Mythological Beauty*][3] although the video puzzles us somewhat.

I feel like I want to…NEED TO…say something about how I felt about this album…but Chris Cox has told me that when I am doing these write-ups to keep it in my pants…so I won’t say anything about this record…I might have told you that it is the best god-damned thing I’ve heard in years…that it marries Josh Tillman’s incredible gift for melodies, crazy ass lyrics, and brilliantly over the top production in a way that somehow is even better than his 2012 album “Fear, Fun”. I might have said that listening to it makes me want to run outside, climb on my roof, and yell at the world that the world (at least my neighbors that are probably calling the cops on me already) is seriously losing the heck out if they (the world) haven’t heard this album…but I won’t do that. (Editor’s Note: You have completely failed in your mission, Shane)

Instead, I will say that this week we discuss Father John Misty’s 2015 record “I Love You Honeybear” and we all had opinions.

You Can Get "Honeybear" Here

Coming Up

Doves. The band, not the shit people release at weddings and funerals. Are doves and pigeons like the same thing, just some are white and not homeless? Shut up Shane you are an idiot. See you in a week,

It's kind of a trick question: when your band sounds a little gloomy to begin with, how can your audience tell when you're despondent?

Maybe that's not fair. Maybe it's possible that Bloodflowers, The Cure's 2000 LP and, per Robert Smith, the end of a trilogy that began with Pornography and continued with Disintegration, is less a swan song and more of the meandering treatise you find when your prior formula's brought great fame but there's not much new left in the tank.

I, for one, actually enjoyed hearing The Cure in a bit of less popularly refracted light, but the average listener, expecting hits, won't find as many here. Is this album a denouement in disguise? The end of a chapter? You make the call.

- Get Your Own Copy!

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A Few Minutes With

[**That Dog** - Minneapolis][2]

A Current Affair

[**Thee Oh Sees** - Plastic Plant][3]

In this episode, we discuss one of several eponymous albums by the Velvet Underground. This is the one with them sitting on a dingy couch. There's some solid tunes on here and then, there's not. Definitely a departure from 1968's White Light/White Heat with John Cale being replaced by Doug Yule and several songs that could use further editing.

The Velvet Underground - The Velvet Underground

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A Few Minutes With

[R.E.M. - Pale Blue Eyes][2]

A Current Affair

[Zettajoule - No Thank You][3]

It's a safe to say that if you have been pushing out music for the past 51 years, you've probably got a little something for everyone. It's also a pretty good chance that not everything in your catalog is going to elicit the same enthusiasm from all audiences. For those of you who appreciate early Prog Rock, you probably like Genesis 1972 release Foxtrot a hell of a lot more than 3/4 of us did. Lauded by many to be one of their top three albums, Foxtrot also marked a change in direction for the stage presence of the band, launching Peter Gabriel from a relatively unknown instrumentalist and vocalist into a strange and surreal performance-art superstar. The lyrics are sometimes cryptic and the music devoid of anything resembling a hook, but one can't deny the level of talent and expertise buried these epic arrangements.

---

Here's a place where you can own your own copy.

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A Few Minutes With

[**Genesis** - Mama][2]

A Current Affair

[**Troye Sivan** - The Good Side][3]

Well, that was interesting! Some of you know Kevin took a paternity leave for a few months last winter. After much hand wringing and late night tears, we found an able replacement in the form of one Mark Couvillion. But, after a somewhat truncated vacation from Somebody Likes It (yeah, this show. Same thing), Kevin returned. Ryan and I (and I would like to think Mark) had been having such a fine time together we all wanted to find a way to keep Mark on board without anybody’s toes being stepped on.

See, as good of a job as Kevin had done producing the show prior to his sojourn, Mark not only enjoyed producing the show in his absence, he also didn’t have a new born to contend with. So we asked him to stay on as Producer Mark, and he agreed, and now we all have the finest of times recording the show in Mark’s garage every week. Then he gives us a great show back(at least as far as production values are concerned) and we’re all happy.

The only thing is, even though Mark often has a mic, Ryan, Kevin, and Myself, just completely dominate the conversation and Mark doesn’t get that much time to talk (cause we’re kind of dicks?). So he posited an idea to me a few months ago, and I ran it by “the other guys” and everybody agreed it was a swell plan.

Instead of the way we usually do things, in which we all rotate picking the 3 segments, Mark would take over the show and pick the album, the video in A Few Minutes With and the song for A Current Affair. It was so much fun to just turn it over to him, and be surprised with his ideas. So for your listening pleasure, here is Producer Mark Hijacks the Show…The Who Sell Out is how we start things off.

Purchase "The Who Sell Out" at Amazon

Coming Up

Yeah back to the same old shit after a month and a half of concept ideas. Ryan picked The Ramones Rocket to Russia…If I’m still alive after surviving that Slim Pickens-like ride, I’ll see you in 7.

So this week Phil came back and we managed not to talk about nasty stuff this time around. In fact, this time around we bandied about the term “Dad-Rock” and whether or not it was a pejorative. Also, we couldn’t remember each other’s names much of the night, making for great confusion.

Oh, I guess I should mention that we talked about Sukierae by Tweedy. The band consists solely of Jeff Tweedy (of Wilco fame) and his son, which is another Dad-rock angle I suppose.

Purchase "Sukierae" on Amazon

Coming Up

Psychocandy by The Jesus and Mary Chain.
Word.

It is tempting with Marvin Gaye to start with the last chapter. To skip ahead to the tragic end, dog ear the page, and work backwards.

But that robs us of a certain sense of who he was at his epiphany, a competitive and deeply original talent who shone in the spotlight, bucked the trends that made Motown buckets of cash, and crafted what Ryan termed 'a sexy protest record.'

And that's what it is.

Not every moment lands here; just as slivers of Marvin Gaye's days ring cinematic, others hollow, he was still, even in chaos, able to push past destruction and tap into wells of inspiration...that kept his work in focus, never beyond the wanting ears of the public consciousness.

Marvin Gaye's life wasn't always cinematic, it just seemed that way.

Listen to the album on Spotify

A Few Minutes With

Modern English - I Melt With You

A Current Affair

Harry Styles - As It Was

It can be difficult to recall on occasion that Willie Nelson is more than just the proverbial Kevin Bacon of country music: true, he's recorded with everyone, true, he's become revered beyond his wildest dreams among a large swath of the American music loving public, and true, he once managed to wrangle his way out of trouble with the IRS, in part, by cutting some Doritos commercials. It's been a weird ride.

 

But there was a time when he found himself at the crossroads to a great enough extent that he laid down in the street in hopes that he might not get up again. This was more than the act of a man who wrote Patsy Cline's breakout hit "Crazy." It was, at the time, an act of desperation.

 

And how delightful it must have felt, then, years later, when he worked his industry position into an album delivered the way that he wanted it, on his terms. He delivered something Nashville brass had no concept might work: a stripped down, road weary tale of a man looking for answers is a world that kept them just out of reach.

 

In the end, the audience had the final say. Let's unspool what all the fuss was about.

Silver Bells: Steve Martin, Paul Simon & Billy Joel

From the moment Martin says that his child asks “Uncle Steve? What’s does Christmas mean to you?,” you’re right to infer that something is about to go very very wrong in this Saturday Night Live rendition of Silver Bells, which featured three artists at the top of their game in the 70s. Pay attention to the eggnog and booze gags, and mind your dime store Santa Clauses, they may be “laying a little groundwork for the future.”

Twelve Days of Christmas: Bob & Doug Mackenzie

Way back in the very first episode of this podcast, Bob & Doug came up (pursuant to Geddy Lee and his Canadian-ness): here we note their take on the Twelve Days, which include lots of beer, five golden touks (a Canadian word, look it up), and plenty of back bacon. It’s a hilarious (if sloppy) rendering.

Centro-matic: Fuselage (It’s Starting to Look Like Christmas Once Again)

Producer Mark drops in as we tackle Will Johnson and company’s take on the holidays, in which he coins the phrase “nicefully” (and it kind of works) and talks up strange family traditions. As someone who comes from a house with a few of those, this rang a little true for me.

James Brown: Santa Claus Goes Straight To The Ghetto

The Godfather of Soul lays out a laundry list of requests for Santa, specifically the stops he might make in the poorer parts of town, where kids don’t have as much to look forward to. Shane’s surprised by his ability to hear James Brown with fresh ears, while Kevin reminds us that James Brown put out all kinds of Christmas albums. The man was, after all, a cottage industry.

The Pogues: Fairytale of New York

Arguably one of my favorite Christmas tunes, the real fairytale here is that Shane MacGowan’s toothless mug and drunk-tank mumblings could romance Kirsty MacColl into such a beautiful duet about New York City. Our Shane reveals that he has something in common with MacGowan (other than name) in that he spends way too many Christmas days drinking in bars, while Ryan helps us with the pronunciation of Nihilism.

The Pretenders: 2000 Miles

Released as a B-side to Middle of the Road in 1983, this is NOT Chrissie Hynde’s expurgated version of the Proclaimers Scottish hit about walking a tremendous distance, although Hynde does admit “2000 miles, it’s very far.” The guys were clearly expecting something very different going into this one, even questioning why I would list it as a Christmas song. In the end, it all coalesces into agreement that this is a pretty song about Christmas.

Wham: Last Christmas

You know who writes a bad-ass Christmas song? Irving Berlin! His little known (and all forgotten) holiday nugget “White Christmas” seems to be the template upon which George Michael based the 1984 classic Last Christmas…Look I make no apologies for my love of WHAM! Shit, this isn’t just one of my favorite Christmas songs, it’s one of my favorite any-time songs.

Bing Crosby/David Bowie: Little Drummer Boy/Peace On Earth

Just as fucking weird and uncomfortable as i remembered…Funny or Die has a word for word re-make of it starring Will Farrell and John C. Reilly that highlights how truly odd it was.

Elmo and Patsy: Grandma Got Run Over By A Reindeer

Hadn’t heard it since I was 10. Not as funny as it was when I was 10.

The Waitresses: Christmas Wrapping

It’s rare that a novelty Christmas song reaches the ridiculous American cultural zeitgeist, yet proves itself as a tune that I’d like to listen to the other eleven months of the year. This is that song. While it’s undeniable that they’re mining similar territory as their most well-known non-yuletide hit, I Know What Boys Like, it still works. It’s infectious, and I look forward to hearing hit cut through the parade of rote sentimentality surrounding the season every December.

REM: Christmas Griping

What would you get if you crossed the percussion from Fleetwood Mack’s Tusk with a Christmas-themed version of The Beatles’ Revolution #9 and a cranky-pants approach to the holiday season? This. You’d get this. Not as unimpressive as I’m making it sound, this is still mostly notable as a novelty, released to their fan club in 1991.

Lou Reed: Xmas in February

A beautiful, if devastating, song, Xmas in February is barely a Christmas tune. It does contain the word “Christmas,” however, so I’ll take it. It’s Reed at his post-Velvet Underground best, chronicling the hardships of a Vietnam vet. It manages to be both beautiful and heartbreaking, and so evocotive of the gritty worldview he became synonymous with. Merry (post-) Xmas!

Once you get past the intrigue of her backstory (PS Eliot drummer with her now Waxahatchee-fronting sister Katie, collaborator with her ex in the apostrophe sporting band Swearin'), Allison Crutchfield -- freshly minted solo artist -- weaves a tangled-by-way-of-intriguing tale on her first full length LP, 'Tourist In This Town.' She may be angsty, but she isn't without something relevant to impart, and what's with so much interesting music coming out of Philly these days? Join us as we break it down (just the one time).

Grab Tourist In This Town on Amazon




A Few Minutes With

"Fish Heads" by Barnes & Barnes; a strange song with an even stranger art film/video directed by and staring the late Bill Paxton.

A Current Affair

Grandaddy's "Last Place", their first output in 11 years, includes Evermore. The video is chock-full of the stuff of psychological group studies.

Have an album you want us to cover? Shoot us a note at messagesomebody@gmail.com

Remember last week when i encouraged you guys to go seek out the cover of Night Moves by Bob Seger? Did you do it yet? That was a pretty easy homework assignment…so if you failed that motherfucker, you are officially out of the class…

Doesn’t really matter what we think about this album, some of us loved it, some of us…didn’t hate it, but eh, ya know…but that god damned album cover staring back at you? That’s the shit dreams are made of…bad dreams, bad-ass dreams!

Hey remember that time Ronald Reagan tried to un-ironically use one of the most ironic songs of the Eighties Born in the USA (copyright Bruce Springsteen) as a campaign song? Well, the palm to forehead that followed for a lot of people 32 years ago became more like a GIF on an endless repeat this year…

Springsteen was blue collar when blue collar wasn’t cool. Springsteen put his damn money where his mouth was long before billionaires co-opted his populist stories, albeit with none of the sincerity or clarity or pathos, or fucking anything other than a line to elicit applause. (CUE: Born in the USA!!)

I know Podcast Overlord Chris hates it when I tip my hand, but this time I think I have to. There is probably not a musical moment on Born to Run that I can relate to. But the STORIES are heart racing and badass and sad and real. And he really has a talent for making the everyday/mundane feel immediate.

I am so bewildered by what is going on in our world right now…why people that are afraid of losing everything in an instant because they are living paycheck to paycheck would put their faith in a person that cares nothing in ANY way about the fact that they are living paycheck to paycheck. These songs celebrate those people living paycheck to paycheck. I don’t know that I will be pulling down Born to Run off of my stack of records anytime soon, but god dammit Bruce Springsteen, I get you now.

And thank you. We fucking needed you this year…(CUE:Born in the USA!!!)

The Music Men put together another mixtape for ya, this time in honor of Memorial Day, as they talk about all the songs on their collection…

Damn Yankees– High Enough: Where do you go after you see this one? Ted Nugent in animal print kimono deflecting bullets with his guitar solo.

Archie Bell and the Drells– The Tighten Up: Ever wondered what it would be like to be conscripted into a dubious foreign war and hear your song become a massive hit, played over Armed Forces radio, while you are trying to fend off the Viet Cong? No? Well, Archie Bell can, and he’s a Houston product, to boot. Highly recommended.

Naked Eyes– Always Something There To Remind Me: First of all, did anyone remember that this was a Burt Bacharach cover? What the what? The video presents the torrid tale of the guy who loses the girl, the other guy (who just happens to be his bandmate) who gets her, and the weird scenario where the local newspaper prints the lowlights of locals’ love lives. At the very least, you’d think that would make you look out for paparazzi. But it’s hooky.

4 Non-Blondes– What’s Up: I picked this because I knew how much it would make Ryan squirm, not counting on the fact I would have to listen to it too. We couldn’t even make it all the way through. Truly one of the worst songs ever recorded.

Starland Vocal Band– Afternoon Delight: Some of my earliest musical memories are of hearing this carpet-bomb 70’s Top-40 radio, and, of course, having no idea of the (not-very-thinly-couched) subtext therein. It’s a song about doin’ it in the daytime. And I completely, unironically, love it.

Carl Douglas– Kung Fu Fighting: There’s a great story in a great book on comedy writing where Steven Seagal was hosting SNL & Rob Schneider wrote a monologue for him where he was supposed to come out and claim that he was really a musician at heart, instead of a martial arts movie star. And then he’d sit down and play an acoustic version of Kung Fu Fighting. That didn’t happen (because Steven Seagal), but it’s a testament to the staying power of this oddball classic.

Timbuk3– Future’s So Bright, I Gotta Wear Shades: Oh the 80’s!

Positive K– I Got a Man: This feels like a backyard barbecue when I get sprung from prison, except it’s a back-and-forth between a lusty gentleman and a reluctant female paramour. In an M. Night Shyamalan-like twist, turns out they’re the same person. Evidently, it takes all kinds. Still love this tune.

Terence Trent D’Arby– Wishing Well: A pretty rock solid way to make sure you’re ridiculed for years is to claim that your one hit song sets you up to be Bigger Than The Beatles. Also, if you’re Terence Trent D’Arby. But we all sort of sang it while it spun.

Billy Ray Cyrus– Achy Breaky Heart: Hahahahahahaha! Damn that was some dumb-ass hair. Also, we are pretty sure this video was recorded right here in Austin at the Paramount Theater…

The Undertones– Teenage Kicks: This song may barely qualify for “hit” status, but it apparently affected the late, massively influential UK DJ John Peel so much that he’d play it twice in a row. And then had lyrics from it inscribed on his headstone. I don’t know if it can ever reach that level for me, but it’s pretty damn great.

The Knack– My Sharona: There’s a certain part of me that figures that in the quiet parts of the world, where you can’t hear anything, you can probably hear a little bit of My Sharona. But what’s weirder is that this song was based on an actual girl, who the author dated for four years, and who then had to spend the rest of her life presumably listening to people singing that track back to her ad nauseum. Sometimes the substance abuse problems come find you.

All three members of Flasher grew up in the Washington, DC area, a metro recently referenced in one review as both 'beautiful' and a 'clattering hellscape' pretty much in the same paragraph.

It's safe to say that it's a complicated place to come of age, and as of recently, they still hadn't actually quit their day jobs, all three of them continuing to wait tables in addition to being label mates with the likes of Arctic Monkeys.

There's a chance Constant Image, their fist full length, could change all of that. And it should be said that the thrill of records like this, occasionally, is that even the band isn't totally sure of what they're supposed to be: that they'll stick the landing is far from assured. Still, that's the thing about the intersection of youth and ambition - occasionally, the chances you take are incendiary.

Flasher - Constant Image

Video for Material

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A Few Minutes With

[sElf - So Low][3]

A Current Affair

[Rhett Miller - Total Disaster][4]

I'm not sure what that has to do with the band 10 cc exactly, what with their high highs and low lows, the same band capable of trotting out a perfect all time classic like 'I'm Not In Love' along side some sort of song about Minestrone (which somehow actually charted).

'I'm Not In Love' alone could have made for a solid hour of chatter, what with the story about how they laid down layers upon layers of voice tracks, the true aesthetic which could be best felt by laying down on the ground in the studio and letting the track wash over them, which they actually did.

Don't get me started on the fact that eventually the band broke up into two equal halves, a pop half and an art half, and that the art half (I think?) was responsible for an all time ditty of their own, and one of the weirdest album covers ever. Swing for the fences, I guess.

No, don't get me started on any of that. But do lend an ear. There are plenty of yarns to spin.

In This Episode:

A Few Minutes With:
Rex Orange County - Loving Is Easy

A Current Affair:
Silk Sonic - Fly As Me

Listen to the album on Spotify

Outside of the empirical truism that 'Bad Art & Weirdo Ideas' is an amazing song title (and that's not even arguable), Beach Slang are a study in certain contrasts and other constant consistencies. Lead singer James Alex fronts a punk act chiefly constructed of members half his age, and for all of his lyrical angst, his spins around the block have brought some noted success.

There have been seriously noted (and politely discussed) brushes with the law, the band has broken up onstage and requested immediate refunds for the audience, and yet, somehow, they not only continue -- but manage to wax prolific. I chose The Things We Do To Find People Who Feel Like Us not because it was their current record (it isn't), but because it seemed to be the exclamation point on a band recklessly rising toward something. Or maybe rising beyond something.

Tune in and find out what that is exactly.

(Got an idea for something we should cover? Shoot it over to messagesomebody@gmail.com)

Pinning down the Roots' legacy isn't quite as simple as acknowledging their current role slow jamming the news on The Tonight Show: in fact, before they were invited into our daily national households, The Roots had to first shake folks up.

Things Fall Apart became the ascendant touchstone for a band that always had chops but never felt dangerous - from the fiery Jim Crow imagery stamped on the cover to the grab you by the throat lyrical turns held within, Questlove, Black Thought and company laid down somewhere in the neighborhood of 145 tracks to whittle down to a final take-no-prisoners fourteen songs, and once the interludes and transitions were sifted in, the record felt like a full on protest - of history, of their careers.

How does it hold up twenty years down the road? Lend an ear and let's see.

Much has been made of Tragically Hip frontman Gord Downie’s terminal condition, and Canada’s responded by treating the band as something of a national treasure, clear up to the prime minister, including a final concert live broadcast viewed by, if the numbers are correct, a full half of the country.

It seems that long ago ‘The Hip’ (again, Canada) achieved critical mass, and it’s with that idea in mind that we dive into their 1998 release Phantom Power. Deemed by some the last record of their most fertile period, this one couldn’t be more Canadian if Bob and Doug McKenzie popped up in hockey jerseys on the cover. It’s a sociological exploration with a musical answer. Tune in.

“So”, as Kevin Newsum, (and let’s face it, Shane Bartell) is “so” fond of saying, we didn’t record an episode of “Somebody Likes It” last week. Instead Ryan and I recorded this together (not Kevin because he was being a grown-up somewhere, and not Producer Mark because he was…being lazy (I guess?) taking a break from making us idiots sound less like idiots, spending a Tuesday night with his lovely wife and lovely children and not shoved into a garage being a grown-up with “Adult Men” that are, let’s face it, less adult every god-damned week we record this freaking show? Wait, were was I?)

Oh yeah, Ryan and I took a Tuesday night to join Chris and Brian (our podcast overlords) to watch the N.W.A. biopic Straight Outta Compton. That was fun. Way more fun than Ryan and I thought the movie wazzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz….oh wait, just woke up from the nap I was taking during the last hour of this TWO AND A HALF HOUR LONG MOVIE. Can somebody explain to me how you make an AIDS death, the beginning of Gansta Rap, Los Angeles and its crazy racial politics circa 1991, and a jew purportedly stealing money from young black men the snooze fest of the summer? Also, apparently I’m in the wrong here, because in the 2 weeks since we watched Straight Outta Compton it has become the run-away hit of 2015. I guess while I was napping, some other people found time to love this film.

Anyway, our take on this movie is all over at “Highly Suspect Reviews”, and I have to say, after listening to Ryan and I on the show, I truly understand where that title comes from

Now…onto the actual episode…

ASK…and ye shall receive! (borrowed, nay, stolen from Michael Jordan or some other important athlete I’m pretty sure). We finally got around to answering the question, “So, what’s the chance you look up from your collective 4 navels for half a second, and listen to a record that a member of the unwashed masses thinks might be an interesting listen”?

Well what WOULD happen if we hypothetically did that? I’ll tell you what would happen. WE DID IT! Cue the bad-ass music (probably Danger Zone-Kenny Loggins) and insert unrelenting motorcycle revving noises here! We listened to the listener suggested “Stone Roses-Second Coming” with a bona-fide “Stone Roses-Second Coming” fan, and it kicked out the proverbial jams (even if not all of us thought the album kicked out the proverbial jams). So credit where credit is due… Nicholas Collier thanks for poking this particular lazy bear in the ribs. Let’s just say we didn’t all agree on our opinion of it, but we did all agree that Chad Swiatecki is a great guest and we need to get his ass back on our show more often.

Show "Second Coming" Some Love Over on Amazon

By now the Jenny Lewis story has been told far and wide: child actress becomes indie darling, and is anyone really surprised when she assembles an allstar team to pull together her latest record (helmed by Beck)? Probably not.

But behind the polished veneer of her most recent release, a few of us wonder if she's been comfortable too long. Too many high fives and back slaps (is that still a thing?) and afternoons by the pool, with a rolodex (is that still a thing?) of anyone she can imagine as collaborator. When that formula lands, the results can be mesmerizing. And when it doesn't, you may just end up with something...pleasant.

And maybe this album is both. We agree on this: there's only one way to find out.

Buy Jenny Lewis On The Line

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A Few Minutes With

[Tony!Toni!Toné! - If I Had No Loot](https://youtu.be/aeGFHHWA5hY)

A Current Affair

[Empath - Roses That Cry](https://youtu.be/PLWA9KKX6EQ)

So… some people have called me out because in our last installment I teased this week’s show with the wrong artist. I said it was gonna be Father John Misty, when in fact it is Pavement. Ok, let’s just say that I was that somebody…nobody but me actually knew about that snafu, cause this show hadn’t been posted yet. But credit where credit is due I think! Shout out to Shane Bartell for not continuing to ignore his fuck-up. Well, you’re welcome, Shane, getting a little too comfortable with picking up the pieces for you by now… please quit screwing up so we don’t have to do this one again.

Ok! Now that this embarrassing incident is behind us, let’s get on to the story.

For some of us that came of age in the 90’s, Pavement pretty much defined the middle part of that decade ( for a whole hell of a lot of people it defined the whole decade.) I fall somewhere in the middle of that line of thinking…Pavement was everywhere but always in the background. I have many fond memories set to their soundtrack.

For this episode, Ryan just had to pick the one Pavement record I don’t love. However, I truly believe it set the tone for what was to come for a large segment of indie rock for years…and that includes Pavement’s subsequent records. After listening to, and talking about “Slanted and Enchanted”, I’ve arrived at the conclusion that this record is both the weakest in the Pavement canon, and valuable mostly as a place-marker in the history of American rock music. I think anyone listening will see how ambivalent the 3 of us were about it…

Actually, let me turn it over to Ryan for a minute and see what he has to say…

After an agonizing 12 minute wait, Ryan says:

“Thanks, Shane. I take full responsibility. Not for the content of
Slanted and Enchanted, as I did not write it or perform on it. But I
did, in fact, select this record for our latest installment of the
meeting of the minds (and drinks) that is “Somebody Likes It.” And in
fact, “ambivalent” does go a long way to describe my feelings for this
particular slice o’ wax. At the risk of sounding like a newlywed who
picked the highly-touted restaurant for an anniversary dinner and
found it lacking (and then took to Yelp to let the world know), I
really wanted to like this more. Even more than that, I wish that that
each and every rock critic in the free world at that time had liked it
less. Perhaps then we’d have all been saved from a decade of smug,
lazy wielders of Tascam cassette recorder “bedroom prodigies”. Laden
with down-tuned guitars and a distaste for song structure, they pretty
much convinced the hipsterati at the time that they were the next big
thing. I, much like Shane, very much appreciate Pavement’s subsequent
output, but had some trouble digesting what sounded to these ears like
nothing so much as some really talented dudes just screwing around and
barely trying. – Ryan Newsum

Couldn’t have summed it up any better than that.

Purchase Slanted and Enchanted on Amazon

The band so nice, we reviewed them twice (note to self:you need to coyright that)…we first came across Canadian group Land of Talk last year during Podcast Overlord Chris Cox’s visit to the show when I picked their song “Quarry Hymns” for A Few Minutes With.Well for this go-round Kevin had us listen to the full-length that spawned that song, “Cloak and Cipher”. Let’s just say we didn’t hate it.

Is that enough suspense for you?

Hey everybody, check this shit out! We’re back! We haven’t gotten fired yet, and I don’t know about you guys, but as far as I’m concerned, that is NOT a familiar feeling. Thanks Chris and Brian! Finally somebody has faith in my crazy ideas! (I’m looking at you Mom).

This week we take on the truly groundbreaking 1988 classic, “Straight Outta Compton”. I was tempted to write this in some clever fashion, with lots of puns and references to how white we are, but as funny and subversive that kind of humor is, I guess I’m just feeling a little blasé this week. I do want to comment on how hilariously silly the lyrics to this album are, and how much things have changed in the intervening 25 years since Straight Outta Compton was released. What seemed scary and “other” has been so co-opted, that now even the unintentionally hilarious is just as funny as the intentional. In fact, sometimes it’s hard for me to discern between the two.

When we were recording I kept trying to remind myself to tell a story but I eventually forgot. I suppose I should share it with you here. At some point in the show I give a character profile of a guy I went to high school with named Judd. There are only 2 things I really remember about Judd.

1. At parties, he would only drink Gatorade mixed with Peppermint Schnapps.
2. He pretty much only listened to NWA. OH!
3. .And He drove a kick ass HUGE 70’s van, (yes, he had a moustache).

It was the first car I had ever ridden in that had neither a working speedometer nor gas gauge; made for lots of adventures, but those are for another day. When that van finally died, he bought an identical one. That was just his identity by that point, you know?

When I was in 10th grade Judd and I went to Padre Island for Spring Break with a group of friends. One afternoon, we were cruising THE VAN up and down the main strip, and every time we passed a group of comely lasses (which was often), Judd would lean out of the window and coo at them “Wasssup LADIES! Wanna party?!”…upon the immediate and inevitable rejection he would invariably mutter “vicious bitches”. This went on for hours, and he never once altered this initial pitch, nor his reaction to the letdown…It was sort of like watching a gif of a dog chasing, then catching, a skunk.

Purchase Straight Outta Compton on Amazon

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### Coming Up ### We’re gonna continue our move out of the 70’s and 80’s and talk about something a hell of a lot more recent: Father John Misty and the 2012 record “Fear Fun”. Lot’s of songs about drinking and drugging. WOO HOOOOO!!!

At some point during the week before we laid down this episode, one of us circulated a Honda scooter ad starring Miles Davis from the 1980s. If you've ever seen it, it's more or less...terrifying, which is a helluva thing to accuse of a Honda scooter commercial from the 1980s. Miles could be well and truly ominous when he wanted to be, even when (sort of) pitching something.

He was, after all, known in his later years for playing entire sets with his back to the paying audience. He wasn't here, specifically, for you.

In 1959, sixty or so years (almost to the day) prior to this episode, Davis assembled a team of players in the stratosphere of their careers: John Coltrane and Cannonball Adderley on sax, pianist Bill Evans, bassist Paul Chambers, drummer Jimmy Cobb and new band pianist Wynton Kelly, who sat in for a track. It was heady company, and by the time they hit the studio, Miles had considered the ideas and signatures behind Kind of Blue thoroughly. The result was a legendary "conversation" between instruments, a subtle juxtaposition of styles that has continued to chart ever since. It's a solid starter jazz record for the neophyte ear, packed with enough nuance to reward repeat listenings from staunch collectors.

Kind of Blue is only six songs long. But the tracks run much deeper than that. In this show, we ponder a classic.

Find it on Amazon

A Few Minutes With

[Blur - *Coffee & TV*](https://youtu.be/6oqXVx3sBOk)

A Current Affair

[Fontaines D.C. - *Boys In The Better Land*](https://youtu.be/TNXrKBt76zI)

When I was in 5th grade, the hot girls in my school would choreograph dance routines to Janet Jackson’s “Control”. So naturally I’ve always had a soft spot for that record. I mean, I don’t like the songs, and would never ever choose to listen to them, but for some reason I’ve always thought fondly of it. Nonetheless, Ryan and Kevin had a different take on it. Ryan especially hated it.
This week we had our first special guest, Jeff Ryder. Jeff actually thought the record was hot, and he was a fan.

Purchase Control on Amazon

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### A Few Minutes With ### Jeff was so much a fan of Ryan’s pick for this week’s standalone song, [When in Rome’s heartwarmingly creepy “The Promise”](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HI_xFQWiYU). While Ryan, Kevin and I all thought the song was pretty good, Jeff fucking despised it. See, Jeff used to work at a piano bar for many years and had to experience so many drunken sorority girl sing-a-longs set to “The Promise”, the song makes him want to stab his eyes out. Regardless, we loved having Jeff on, and we’ll definitely have more guests in the future.

Coming Up

For the next three weeks, rather than pick an album the 3 of us don’t know all too well, we are all picking one we individually know very well. Kevin gets the ball rolling with Air Miami’s “Me. Me. Me”. (and I have Peaches singing about fucking the pain away). We’ll see how that ends up.

I'm not a sadist. Really. Just because every so often I bring out something like "Slippery When Wet" or "Open Up and Say Ahhhh!" that doesn't mean I enjoy torturing the other show hosts, it just means I enjoy a lively discussion (after all, I have to listen to those albums too). But if you were to just listen to Kevin and Ryan you would think I stuck them in a closet with a Ray Stevens album on repeat (hmmm, note to self: Ray Stevens).

So in the spirit of peace, I brought something to the table I was pretty sure Ryan was gonna eat up and go back for seconds! The Gotobeds' "Poor People Are Revolting" did the trick. All the late 70's post punk/mid-90's indie rock you could ever want to find in one album. So please enjoy. And don't start bitching next time I show up with that Ray Stevens record (they call him the streak...)

Pick up this week's album from The Gotobeds on their Bandcamp page.

Also this week, we spend A Few Minutes With Ultimate Fakebook's Tell Me What You Want.

For A Current Affair we listen to the beautiful voice of Nina Diaz performing her single, January 9th, for the Tiny Desk Concert series.

Next episode is our 100th Somebody Likes It. Tune in to hear our picks from top 100 lists from the 70's, 80's, 90's, and 00's.

Remember the first time you asked yourself “What the fuck is a Wonderwall”? Cause you heard that song by Oasis, and had no idea what the hell Liam Gallagher was yelling about? At one time Wonderwall was a cultural touchstone pretty much on par with the Kennedy Assassination, and the Challenger Explosion, but I feel like we as a country have pretty much forgotten that. And that’s shameful. Shame on us.

Well, as it turns out, Noel Gallagher, the bloke (nailed it) that wrote it, still remembers it. In fact the opening track of Chasing Yesterday the newest release by Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds, makes sure you know that. Gallagher has never been afraid of “cribbing”, “borrowing” “stealing” melodies and turning them into great new songs, and it’s pretty bad-ass to see him use his proclivities for that type of stuff as he cribs from himself. I’ll spare you my feelings on this record until you listen to this episode (hint:great record) because as Chris Cox (one of the Oneofus.net Godfathers) has told me, if you give the milk away for free, nobody will want to buy the cow. I’m not actually sure that he put it that way, as we were up late drinking at Nomad Bar, but I feel like it was something along those lines. But everybody didn’t agree with my assessment of Chasing Yesterday, so what the hell, have some free milk.

Go Get "Chasing Yesterday" from Amazon Women

A Few Minutes With

Ryan gave us the gift of Aldo Nova’s Fantasy (Life is just a fantasy, can you live this fantasy life?) for our A Few MInutes With segment. It’s an incredibly entertaining mid 80’s video. Let’s just say there are guitars that are also laser guns. AND Aldo Nova is a dude, not a band name?! Also, he co-wrote Blaze of Glory with Jon Bon Jovi.

A Current Affair

Wrapped it up with Kate Tempest rapping about how you can barely get a retail job even with a degree.

Coming Up

We finally do a show based on a listener suggestion! Stone Roses Second Coming. I’ll just suggest that the title’s hubris is just that. Hubris (some more free milk)…See you in 7

What does one say about Josh Tillman? He is an odd dude. That said, the three of us kind of had a love-in discussing the Father John Misty Album “Fear Fun”. I earned back some good-will after the whole Bon Jovi incident (which I’m gonna need when they see what I have planned next.)

A few Josh Tillman quotes:

On the writing of Fear Fun:

“I got into my van with enough mushrooms to choke a horse and started
driving down the coast with nowhere to go. After a few weeks, I was
writing a novel, which is where I finally found my narrative voice….
It was a while before that voice started manifesting in a musical way,
but once I settled in the Laurel Canyon spider-shack where I’m living
now, I spent months demoing all these weird-ass songs about weird-ass
experiences almost in real-time, and kind of had this musical
‘Oh-there-I-am’ moment, identical to how I felt when I was writing the
book.”

On the name “Father John Misty”:

“I had to give it a name, so I kind of wanted to confuse people with
this ridiculous red herring [and] admittedly patently ridiculous name
that’s also phonetically beautifully and looks good in print. Sort of
a name I’ve decided to give to this weird, subconscious, dream
fragmentation I have of this homosexual, shamanic drifter who bounces
around [and] stirs up weird shit in my dreams. Like making out with my
brother. So I guess the aggregate of all those things just felt right.
But really and truly, the whole thing is just kind of about the fact
that it really doesn’t matter what the fuck you call yourself, as long
as the goods are in the explicit honesty.”

On the book that he wrote:

“It’s about this couple named Charles and Agnes Brimley, and Charles
is an author writing this book about a herd of post-apocalyptic
chihuahuas,” Tillman explains, “They go to Salt Lake City, walk by a
funeral home, impersonate another couple, and order a ’69’ casket for
themselves—a casket that you can 69 in. While Charles is writing his
book, he gets into the casket and realizes that the voice of God is in
there, and God’s name is Josh Tillman, and Josh Tillman divulges the
secrets of Charles’ universe. I really like how the book is going so
far.”

So, pretty great stuff if you ask me.

Purchase Fear Fun on Amazon

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### Coming Up ### Next week we tackle Hole, “Live Through This”, whereupon I might tackle Kevin for making me live through listening to this album (MY GOD, I’m getting good at this).

Years after crafting a sound so unique that a fledgling movement spun up around it, Portishead walked away from notoriety and their Trip hop roots that influenced so many. Away from the dark corners and come hither beats, punctuated by Beth Gibbons' pained yarns of yearning and regret, away from all of it. Until they didn't.

Borne to some degree out of the threads they continued to explore after their first two pivotal LPs, the band's literally named Third release finds them still uncertain, still haunted, but still certainly curious and exploratory. Hell, there's even a ukulele that makes an appearance. Pretty sure no one saw that twist coming.

What happens if you take the Trip hop out of Portishead? You're about to find out.

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Amazon has the album for sale.

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A Few Minutes With

[**PJ Harvey** - Sheela-na-gig][2]

A Current Affair

[**Sylo Nozra** - Felt You][3]

Human frailty isn’t exactly a novel conceit, nor are we surprised by youthful angst, but then again, those sentiments aren’t always delivered in authentic ways, by burgeoning and sincere anti-ingenues. Such is the dilemma we faced when peering into the tattered world of Julien Baker, a twenty-year-old artist whose solo foray forced the often raucous music world to stop and take note. Is it possible to wax both fragile and rebellious? We’re not sure either.

Holy Shit! Hank Williams Jr. is lazy. I mean, I’m not questioning his actual work ethic or anything (judging from the inclusion of a private jet on the cover of “High Notes”, he probably flies around a lot), no, I’m aiming square at the shit he writes about. Before we took on “High Notes” this week, most of my exposure to Hank Williams had come from his damn NFL stuff, and his penning of the line I consider to be one of the greatest in music EVER:

“I’d like to spit some Beech-Nut in that dude’s eye”

There has to be some more gems like that one out there right? Not that I can dig up. In fact, that’s pretty much what this week’s show amounts to, us discussing how lazy these songs are. Check the box of just about any requisite country song topic circa 1980 and Williams has got a paint by numbers version of it ready for you here.

So I thought when I was writing this, I would go online and pull up some more hilarious examples of his lyrics. But the thing is, they are all pretty much just as lazy and imagination deprived as anything on “High Notes” (which by the way, title not withstanding these are not greatest hits or a high water mark of songwriting excellence, just a way for some label execs to dress up an even more mediocre record than he usually turned in). Surely there had to be something good on “If The South Woulda Won” or even “McCain-Palin Tradition”? Nope.

BUT! There is a cover of “Norwegian Wood”.

Purchase High Notes on Amazon

The history of the world is full of brave heroes. Men and women that took on things that no one else would consider touching with a pole of any length. Well, I think you can add Kevin, Ryan, and Myself to that list. Who else would have had the huevos grande (that’s big balls for those monolinguals) to take on a critical discussion of Bob Dylan’s “Blood on the Tracks”? But don’t worry, it ended up being lots of fun and not too inflammatory. Also, it marked a return to our roots as it once was: just the 3 of us back in the garage.

Buy "Blood On The Tracks"

---

We also discussed a Matthew E. White song and an interesting one by Dennis Wilson, lesser known these days than his brother Brian, but a great songwriter no less.

Be back in a week with some Lupe Fiasco talk.

“So that’s how it’s gonna be”–Kevin (probably what he is gonna say)

Once upon a time, there were three long time friends that decided to record a very opinionated music oriented podcast. Then one day, “Dad” went on vacation and “Little Brother” and “Other Dude” decided to “fuck shit up”…and “Producer Mark” a.k.a. “The Adult” let them run amok (Thanks Producer Mark, or should I thank your “Cocktails”).

Ok, that is getting tedious. Basically Kevin went on vacation, and Phil Ajjarapu joined Ryan and Mark and myself in a spirited discussion of the Ramone’s third album Rocket to Russia…A fine time was had by all.

Purchase "Rocket To Russia" on Amazon.com

A Few Minutes With & A Current Affair

But then it got a little more “Please tell Mom not to listen to this Episode-y”.

Phil was (kinda) coerced into picking Smell Yo Dick for the video in “A Few Minutes With”…and I had already said I was picking War on Drugs:Suck My Cock by Sun Kil Moon for “A Current Affair”, so all of a sudden it was like taking a corner in a dune buggy and then the dune buggy stalls out and tips over. But just like I would imagine that everyone riding in said buggy would crawl out laughing, so did we (until Chris Cox and Kevin Newsum hear the show).

Coming Up

You will experience the brilliance of Kilroy Was Here by Styx. Do I hear a Mr. Roboto chant building???

Hello everyone, so nice to see you all again!

Allow me to welcome you to Round 3 of “Somebody Likes It”, wherein your three hosts gather in Kevin’s garage and try not to die from heat stroke. It’s summer time in Austin Texas, and for some unknown reason, not one of us remembered that without an air conditioner in Kevin’s garage, things were bound to get a little steamy. And I don’t mean like in a Sexy Movie way. Even leaving the beer fridge open was no help. At one point I almost lost an arm when it stuck to recording table.

For our third episode, we decided to tackle “Rumors” by Fleetwood Mac. At first glance it seemed kind of an odd choice to me (Ryan’s turn to choose), but when I was listening to it I realized that so many of the songs had become like wall paper to me. Their ubiquitous nature had removed any emotion from them. However, this is one of the bestselling records of all time. At 40 million sold (and counting) somebody really fucking likes this. I think we all came to the realization that the back story was pretty important to a lot of those songs, and by extension, a lot of those sales.

Things are starting to click a little better in the (hot) garage. We all feel like we’re starting to get the hang of how to keep the show moving, and not get bogged down in tangents as much. We’re still figuring out some of the audio stuff, but that’s getting better every week too. By next week, that stuff should be mostly sorted out.

Purchase Rumours on Amazon

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### Coming Up ### Oh, and speaking of next week, it’s gonna be a doozy. It was my week to choose, and I made Kevin and Ryan listen to Bon Jovi’s “Slippery when Wet”. Let’s just say it was worse than I thought it would be: their responses to my choice, as well as the record itself. It’s bad, really bad. Really really bad.

See you next week…

Not all artists who grow up under dubious circumstances emerge as groundbreakers on the other side, but essentially, that's at least one dimension of Anderson.Paak's multifaceted rise.

Paak — aka the erstwhile Breezy Lovejoy — has come a long way from a bumpy childhood that saw him crafting tracks in his bedroom, to a stunted stint as a marijuana farmer, to a first record that caught the attention of one Dr. Dre, who had him guest on no less than six tracks of his comeback effort.

It seems even when he wasn't on the map, Paak was never far from its focus. His second album, Malibu, had the full attention of tastemakers, and the forecast has called for steady praise ever since.

Join us as we bend an ear and figure out what all the fuss is about And as always, route us thoughts of your own at messagesomebody@gmail.com

Buy Malibu on Amazon

What the hell is up with Sweden! Those motherfuckers know their way around a melody. You could spend all day making mix-tapes of Abba or Cardigans songs, but instead let me propose this. You should maybe consider listening to this episode of Somebody Likes It wherein we discuss the album "Passive Agressive" by Swedish band Radio Dept. That record is already a mixtape of sorts, as it is a collection of singles and b-sides. Maybe we liked it, maybe we didn't. That's a mystery you'll need to unravel yourself. If you're up to it. Chicken. Bok-bok...

Pick up The Radio Dept. on Amazon

LL Cool J (hip)hops in to Rock The Bells for A Few Minutes With
and we take a nice psychedelic digestif in the form of Slowdive's Star Roving (or is it Star Rover?).

As cliched as it sounds, Sadie Dupuis might actually be some sort of tour de force: the chief creative element behind the ascending Speedy Ortiz (which, best I can tell, is neither speedy nor boasts an Ortiz), Dupuis recently knocked out an MFA in poetry, which she wields to hone razor-sharp lyrics on Speedy tracks. This band swims in the same hip kids pond that New England influences Pixies, The Breeders and Dinosaur Jr. first explored, and it may not be a shock that we have a tendency to think that’s noteworthy.

Camper Van Beethoven. Well who the fuck knew? I had heard stuff before, but in my head they had kind of defined the mid-80’s “let’s throw everything at the wall, and fuck it, let’s try and be funny at the same time” ethos I found so spread all over the place during that period of time. But this damn album, “Key Lime Pie“, got my attention. It didn’t feel like one long Dead Milkmen song, it was BEAUTIFUL.

Even if Mark broke the rules by putting up an album he knew very well, it was fine by me, cause the rest of us didn’t, and we all walked away better people having heard it.

Get Some "Key Lime Pie" on Amazon

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### A Few Minutes With ### AND! I snuck in some [Corinne Bailey Rae](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hr01oIrRVu8)… Phil (making another awesome guest appearance) had a lot to add to that discussion…

Coming Up

See you guys next week…we’re tackling an LCD Snoresystem album…and something about some “Pink Pannies”…hmmm…talk soon.

Welcome back dear listener for another edition of “Somebody Likes It”, the show that every week takes a purposefully ambiguous concept and rambles in circles obscuring it even more.

The reviews are in from the first show and they are resoundingly MIXED! That right, some of you found our stories hilarious and some of you just wanted us to get to the point. I will say that I feel confident that as the weeks go on we’ll be pulling those two extremes together, right now we’re still figuring this stuff out. So there.

Ok, on to this week’s show. This week we’ll be discussing Paul’s Boutique, the record that set the stage for the second act of the Beastie Boys career. I think after the show we all walked away with a better understanding of why Ryan thinks the Beastie Boys are always yelling at him.

Purchase Paul's Boutique on Amazon

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### Coming Up ### Fleetwood Mac and their FM Radio Juggernaut “Rumors”. Some people out there really like that record.

So let's just start with the obvious: we don't know where the scarf is.

We don't know if the legends about said scarf are real, nor do we have insight from various Gyllenhaals as to the status of the aforementioned scarf, and we don't know with certainty that Taylor Swift, when you break up with her, is contractually obligated or otherwise driven to write ten minute super catchy ditties heavily inferring that she wants her scarf back.

We don't know any of that.

What we do know is that she writes borderline illegally infectious pop ditties that at times make otherwise serious human beings feel like they're...twenty-two. That her popcraft is of such finely hewn nuance that she can reimagine many of her breakout works, layer in a dizzying array of collaborations, and even deftly cede the spotlight from time to time is pretty telling.

It's a memorable party, you just may get emotional at the end.

Also, we take a magnifying glass to 'Bust A Move' -

Find it on Amazon

A Few Minutes With

Young MC - Bust A Move

A Current Affair

fanclubwallet - Car Crash in G Major