If it’s far out, was it ever far in?

Friday May 2

The Flaming Lips – “Free Radicals”

Ryan Adams – “Halloweenhead”

Yeah, I’ve been alone on the highway late at night and proudly butchered this song at the top of my lungs. What of it? Mindless idiot-rock from Ryan Adams, of all people. Still, he managed to turn this into a piano ballad when I saw him at Cain’s a few months ago. Unreal.

Hey Mercedes – “Eleven to Your Seven”

The Feds – “Angels & Devils”

Ryan Adams & The Cardinals – “Magnolia Mountain”

Low – “Closer”

Jesse Malin – “High Lonesome”

Islands – “Jogging Gorgeous Summer”

Elbow – “Fugitive Motel”

Mute Math – “You Are Mine”

Watched a couple Mute Match videos on YouTube before a party this weekend (a party at which I am rumored to have set myself on fire, even if I dispute it). Somehow, I think I managed to see Mute Math play a less-than-stellar show at Cain’s a few months back. This isn’t to say I wasn’t floored at that Cain’s show – it was easily one of the most extraordinary and original things I’ve ever seen. That rhythm section is alien, I swear. I only say less-than-stellar now, after seeing the madness that ensues at other shows. This band might just take over the world with its next record, or it might just fade away. Either way, at least I got to see it.

Stars – “The First Five Times”

Guster – “Two Points for Honesty”

RAWK SAWNG OF THE DAY: Injected – “Burn it Black”

Tom Waits – “Blue Skies”

June 23 – Dallas at Palladium
June 25 – Tulsa at Brady Theatre

The Who – “My Generation” 

Ben Folds Five – “Your Redneck Past”

Breakdown: 16 songs, two places

I’ll be working out of the paper’s Capitol Bureau from now until next Friday. This means little-to-no time for tuneage at work. Instead, I’ll be listening to the music of conference committee reports, filibusters, partisan pandering and engrossed bills. May God help us all.

Short playlists ahead, but big news music news for yours truly will make up for it. Stay tuneage-d.

Bombed

After finishing one of the best records I should’ve known about three years ago, today’s playlist was:

Rose Hill Drive – “Cross the Line”

Ears were ringing for days after I first saw these guys. I didn’t mind a bit. I’m sure the other 20 people there felt the same way and would gladly brave the sonic assault once again. As badass as the show was, I kept wondering and cursing how a band can open for The Who at Ford Center and be named one of Rolling Stone’s top bands to watch in 2007 only to play for 20 people at Conservatory. Especially when they’re as good as Rose Hill Drive. I blame these clowns, who clearly represent all that is wrong with the universe.

LCD Soundsystem – “give it up”

Hey Mercedes – “A-List Actress”

The Feds – “Juliet”

Wilco – “Misunderstood”

One of the most underrated – and “misunderstood” – choices Wilco ever made was selecting this song as the opening track to Being There. It was a proverbial middle finger to everything everyone ever thought they were, and it pissed off a lot of folks. I’ve always thought the sign of a great artist is the willingness to risk their reputation for art, even if it alienates people. Many of my favorite records have that quality to them, and Being There is a perfect example. 

Guided By Voices – “Gold Star for Robot Boy”

The Flaming Lips – “Goin’ On”

Guster – “Fa Fa”

Foo Fighters – “New Way Home”

Eels – “Teenage Witch”

RAWK SAWNG OF THE DAY: AC/DC – “Back in Black”

Could there logically be any other choice? Absolutely not. Anyone who disagrees gets ten minutes alone in a room with no windows with the maniacs below:

The Land Down Under brings us the RAWK SAWNG OF THE DAY from AC/DC and today’s BEST BAND YOU’VE PROBABLY NEVER HEARD: Skybombers. These guys don’t have a record deal in the U.S. yet, but they’re lighting fires in Australia. I bought their five-song EP a few minutes ago after hearing one verse and one chorus online. Anyone who knows me knows I don’t make up my mind that easily 99 percent of the time. That’s how good these Aussie rockers are. The song that grabbed me isn’t on the EP, but it’s called “Always Complaining” and has more hooks than a tacklebox. After a first listen, the best track on the EP is this ferocious freakout called “Russian Roulette” that’s the RAWK SAWNG I’ve been waiting to hear all year.

Plenty of bands like to brand themselves as Clash / Kinks / Stooges hyrbids, but more often than not those bands are putrid embarrassments. Not Skybombers. They can actually claim those three as peers without sounding like pompous hipster knobs. The songs on this EP swagger and swing with that confident recklessness the aforementioned bands had, only the hooks are bigger. That’s a dangerous cocktail and I love it. Hell of a find for a Monday night.

Point of the gushing is: Don’t be surprised if Skybombers blow up like Hiroshima.

Weekend starts when?

Hey Mercedes – “Our Weekend Starts on Wednesday”

Jay Farrar – “Damn Shame”

The Clash – “Clampdown”

The Clash – “Lost in the Supermarket”

The Feds – “Tonight Inside”

Jay Farrar – “Vitamins”

Ryan Adams – “29″

The Fags – “Greatest Movie Ending”

RAWK SAWNG OF THE DAY: Big Wreck – “The Pleasure and the Greed”

Kenna – “Out of Control (State of Emotion)”

The Used – “Sound Effects and Overdramatics”

The Coral – “Spanish Main”

U2 – “Trip Through Your Wires”

BEST BAND YOU’VE PROBABLY NEVER HEARD: Elbow – “Not a Job”

Best song on this band’s second record, A Cast of Thousands. Patient, moody Brit-rock. Anyone who can make a harmony out of dreary lines like this gets my respek: “The dream again nobody understands / Walking through the long grass on your hands / It’s not a job to do today / Sleep it off.”

Kill Radio – “Do You Know (Knife in Your Back)”

See below.

Kenna – “Hell Bent”

Strange pairing of Kenna and Kill Radio. A couple years back, some major label types convinced the band I once worked with to drive out to Los Angeles for a showcase at The Viper Room. Being the naive little bastards we were, we accepted and blew all the money we had to get out there. The band Upside played with at Viper Room was Kill Radio. The other act Upside’s manager at the time managed was Kenna. Both went largely unnoticed, but are two of my favorites to this day. Another strange connection: the guy who signed Kill Radio to Columbia Records was former MTV VJ Matt Pinfield, who seriously considered signing Upside to Columbia after the band once again blew all their money to make a trip to New York to showcase for more label types at Knitting Factory. A good line from the Kill Radio song in today’s playlist: “In the night they stole it, left you skin and bones and a knife in your back.”

Bernard Butler – “Smile”

The Stills – “Changes are No Good”

Sloan – “Back Stabbin’”

Queens of the Stone Age – “Do it Again”

Queens of the Stone Age – “Go With the Flow”

Spoon – “This Book is a Movie”

The Arcade Fire – “Crown of Love”

Bloc Party – “Banquet”

Islands – “If”

The Thrills – “Whatever Happened to Corey Haim?”

Ben Kweller – “Family Tree”

Built to Spill – “The Weather”

Ryan Adams – “Magnolia Mountain”

First time I saw Ryan Adams at Gypsy Tea Room in Dallas, this was the only song he played that could’ve passed for an actual performance. The man was a complete and utter disaster. I couldn’t listen to him for months. Luckily, Daily Tuneage comrade Redbee and her man convinced me to see him again at Cain’s a few months ago. Like night and day. I can’t even remember if he played this song. I just remember everything was perfect.

Breakdown:

29 songs

3 during commute to work

25 at work

1 during commute home

Short on time. No diatribe today.